How do I make the bottom "taskbar" shiny?

[bobbo85]

The bottom bar with the Kmenu was once black with this cool shiny and translucent look to it... how can I get that? I tried using compiz and its "reflection" plugin, but that just adds a different look to window titlebars.

On a side note, using kde4, could someone please explain when I can/can't use "System settings" in the kmenu for themes/effects vs using the compiz icon for advanced desktop settings... do they both work together? does one of them override the other? it's just a bit confusing.

[claydoh]

Re: How do I make the bottom "taskbar" shiny?

To change your taskbar theme, right-click on your desktop and select 'desktop settings'. In there you can select different plasma themes, and download some new ones as well.

I am not 100% sure what you mean about using system settings for compiz. I don't run compiz, but I don't believe that there are any compiz settings in System Settings. The Desktop Effects settings in S-S are for Kwin's desktop effects only - Compiz is a totally different thing there. Also, as compiz basically replaces your window manager, it uses its own things for window borders, buttons, themes, etc. So any window decoration set up in S-S does not effect anything used in compiz (beryl emerald themes).

So, basically it boils down to this: if you are using compiz, you need to use compiz's tools to change any theme settings and use compiz/emerald themes.

If you want to use KDE based window decorations, you will need to disable compiz and use KDE's built-in Desktop Effects (which is what I do). Not as blingy right now, but it works rather well for me.

[bobbo85]

Re: How do I make the bottom "taskbar" shiny?

Fixed it:
First I updated to kde 4.1.1, and that broke some stuff... so to fix it, I deleted my .kde4 folder in home, then everything was fixed and I got my cool taskbar back! I think it just reset all of my config stuff and that must have removed whatever conflicts were happening.

Btw thank you claydoh for the explanation, it will help me not screw things up moving forwards!

[claydoh]

Re: How do I make the bottom "taskbar" shiny?

I keep forgetting that bit.

usually you won't need to delete the whole .kde4 dir. In this case I think deleting the plasmarc file in ~/.kde4/share/config would probably fix that issue. new versions/fixes to plasma seem to break the settings sometimes. I have not seen this
myself in Intrepid for a while now