1. I don't get any of these. And by trying out your VMs, I don't see anything like that there either. It must be something you've tweaked in you local configuration.
2. Can you elaborate on this [pop-ups]? I don't see what you're talking about here either.
3. What did you change for the hover effect on the panel launcher icons?
4. Not sure about that. Maybe it makes it more familiar for photoshop users. But we can't use that as it is. It makes no sense to bundle all those fonts like that, only for the sake of gimp and I'm not really sure it is legal to do so.
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1. My VM's are just a 'showcase' for better default configuration and examples for Mac-like and Ubuntu-like setups, and IceWM is ... NIce WM. They are not related to the issues described, and yes, they show the same issues.
Since I found those issues during the 'just playing around' session and wasn't properly testing (== didn't make any notes on how to reproduce the issue), I can't give you any details, but the cause is not my tweaked local configuration. True, it could be that some issues become even more obvious, as, as we know, one pixel can 'make or break' Xfce configuration.
Since I have at least a half dozen of installations, altered and always one unaltered, I picked up the last, unaltered Salix 15 beta installation and made a short video to show you how the issues are there.
In the first part of video, just follow the cursor (mouse pointer). We are pretending to be an ordinary user, who is trying different presets, and at the end, it decides to go back to the original Salix preset. Since the purpose of that first part of the video is only to show the missing start menu button and pop-downs instead of pop-ups, you should always watch how the button comes and goes and our regular user stays without the start menu button at the end (in Salix preset!).
https://gofile.io/d/8EsYV5
2. It's visible on some of the screenshots, but it should be clear after watching the first part of the video.
3. It should be clear after watching the second part of the video. However, it has some issues ... you could contact me on my e-mail ...
4. I forgot to remove the fonts, and the latest PhotoGimp ships with (out): "NOTE: PhotoGIMP will no longer ship with fonts installed as default."
https://github.com/Diolinux/PhotoGIMP/releases
As of "more familiar for photoshop users" ... Basically almost every photo-manipulating software ever made is using "Photoshop-like" layout. Affinity, Corel, as well as most of those fewer known or cheaper 'amateur' programs ... except the Gimp, and almost all of the past and future users are coming to Linux from Windows, and from those applications ...
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What you can or what you can't, you must know. It is your distribution, and you'll need to decide.
I can only tell theme X is better because ... or icon-set Y is better because ... or configuration Z makes more sense because ...
But, if you decide to take the worse, because 'you like it' or whatever, there's gonna be another 'could've been good, but it isn't' Xfce around.
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Xfce basically is a combination of broken WM and broken extensions, broken themes, broken icon-sets, broken documentation etc., and there is currently not a one singe properly looking or functioning Xfce around.
(Please don't pick on me with 'I thought that 'broken' means it's not starting -- you all know what am I talking about and why do I invest that much time in it.)
Here you get two more 'broken' examples, one from Salix and another from Zorin (for a good reason!), but basically, it's not about the distro -- it's about the Xfce.
DistroWatch Weekly, Issue 978, 25 July 2022, post #14
https://distrowatch.com/weekly.php?issue=20220725
https://ibb.co/yszgJ94
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Thunar layout
Open Thunar and choose 'Show hidden files'
https://ibb.co/YNbD6Lp
Note the previous layout, and what will happen next
https://ibb.co/qBsSvQK
Uncheck 'Show hidden files' again
https://ibb.co/JttNkQj
You just got a new layout
https://ibb.co/2ckNvqF
Now, go level up
https://ibb.co/vVrPqQM
You'll end up here
https://ibb.co/xChX6g5
Now, click 'back'
https://ibb.co/nPWymCp
The layout changed again, and the very first view is back
https://ibb.co/VLcjvT9
This is productivity-killer.
You know, 'visual memory' ... 'second row, second from the left is what I need' ... uuups, where is it?
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Next 'who cares about 1 pixel' issue ...
I did choose Zorin 16.1 because it is the only Xfce distribution where the developers made some effort to make it look good and behave more friendly, but that's the case only until you don't touch the defaults. I don't consider their default theme a good choice (the contrast is very bad), but that's completely irrelevant for the Xfce issue.
Default task bar (panel) height 40 px
https://ibb.co/6gCT3NM
At 16 px everything looks exactly the same as 40 px
https://ibb.co/tcXSjNS
At 22 px icons grow up, one icon is only a dark square (missing), and the othe one has a new background color, and all three have different size
https://ibb.co/qpLBn63
At 23 px, all three icons grow up, one loses 'mysterious' background color, and the network icon is much smaller / different size
https://ibb.co/jT68SQ9
At 24 px (== bigger than 23), two of three icons are getting SMALLER and now, have the same size as the network, but battery grows up further
https://ibb.co/f9wg4Wf
At 25 px, network stays small, but other three icons are getting bigger and are now all same size
https://ibb.co/bNVkj3F
At 32 px, network is still small (the correct size) and the other 3 icons are huge, much bigger than application starters
https://ibb.co/vLpcmMs
That's not how it is supposed to work in the year 2022 ...