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Yosemite looks terrible!
- Thread starter OldGuyTom
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Flavours is a hack. OS X API does not directly allow any binary to modify other application's appearance. Doing so requires memory injection, and it is definitely a hack...
But Flavours is, though, a relatively well-coded and tested hack that has minimal performance and stability impact on the system.
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Thanks.
The most recent (second?) Sneak Peak version can make Yosemite much easier on the eye.
Whilst I have not experimented with a combination of (a) Flavours 2 plus (b) f.lux plus (c) avoiding Apple’s preferred system font, I can now tolerate most of Yosemite with the dark variant of ‘Lion - Refined and with classic f.lux preferences.
Still, the overall appearance is nowhere near good enough for me to treat Yosemite as an acceptable replacement for Mavericks. Apple must allow some of the basics to be more easily fixed.
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Looking at your screenshot there are more inconsistencies with flavours than without it: redlight buttons on system preferences that don't seem to cooperate (I suspect iTunes is no different), that popup menu that looks really weird with the black text. Also, but that's just me, the dock without background is confusing when windows are behind it. The dark borders looks like "increase contrast" has been turned on.
I'm not saying Yosemite is the ideal situation, far from it, but to date the various enhancements that are supposed to make the GUI look better (those I've seen at least) have actually made it worse. imho.
Still butt ugly...!
Trust me when I say Yosemite is beyond hope...
The only reason it's on a bigger market pie is partly because Apple shoved it down the throats of users who buy new Macs...
I think you mean memory injection. Why would Flavours need to inject code into an app's memory to override system API calls to draw various UI elements? It would need to do this for every single app running on the system that draws anything it themes. Why wouldn't flavours run as a process that intercepts all API calls to draw the UI elements it themes on the fly instead regardless of the app making the call?
All of my development experience was with Windows and UNIX so maybe you can enlighten me here. What exactly in detail do you believe Flavours is doing to theme the OS X UI? I expect that is all it is doing. In other words, i would not expect it to be altering any custom UI elements in a given app and plenty of apps do have these.
By the way, from the dictionary available in OS X, a software hack is generally regarded as: "a piece of computer code providing a quick or inelegant solution to a particular problem."
Flavours 2 hardly meets the widely understood definition of the term. I would consider altering system files an inelegant solution to put it mildly thus I mentioned it does not do that and claimed it is not a hack which it isn't. This is a product to theme the OS X UI. You may feel this product accomplishes what it does via a hack but I would disagree until you can provide credible information to prove otherwise.
Where do you get your information about performance and stability impact? Exactly what stability issues does it introduce? How does drawing one UI element vs another considering the means by which this is done affect performance in any perceptible way on a modern computer system?
Don't take any of this personally but anyone on the internet can post whatever they like. That doesn't mean it is necessarily correct and thus my questions for you. I'd be very interested in clear, explicit details to back up what you are saying with supporting evidence before I'm going to take that information seriously.
What would be nice is if Apple would just build in theming but no!
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Its worth noting that for all the griping that's been done about Yosemite, Apple is changing the system font in 10.11. Seems these complaints don't fall on deaf ears after all.
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/05/20/apple-san-francisco-font-ios-9-osx-1011/
I just hope they'll also take notice of the contrast, namely eliminating the use grey type on bright white background, that would go a long way in making the OS easy on the eye (again).
https://www.macrumors.com/2015/05/20/apple-san-francisco-font-ios-9-osx-1011/
I just hope they'll also take notice of the contrast, namely eliminating the use grey type on bright white background, that would go a long way in making the OS easy on the eye (again).
"However, some Apple engineers have told us that they are not fans of the new font, which may look particularly rough on non-Retina screens."
I guess we just have to wait and see... I truly, truly hope they're not forgetting how many of us DON'T use retina screens.
...I completely agree with you about the font color, make it black again and a pretty large chunk of the problem is gone.
Update: The latest preview of Flavours 2 has eliminated this problem. All commands relating to Messages in Apple Mail are working fine now with Flavours 2 turned on.
Etan
Why Wait for OS X 10.11? How to Use the San Francisco System Font on OS X Yosemite NowYou're making the assumption it will be a better font.
Please keep in mind this gives you a "sneak preview" but not a true picture of the final product. Decisions about color, weight and sizing can change the whole look of things in Apples release.
I totally agree, I really think the new leadership is not as picky and it shows. People argue with me saying Jobs was superfluous, but I say the result was very high quality products.
The focus is on ecosystem more than products. Its a thing here in the valley, everyone is trying to find new ways to trap the consumer.
You're making the assumption it will be a better font.
And I read here that some Apple designers were unsure of how it would work on non-retina displays. I have a retina display, but when I'm home it is in clamshell mode hooked up to a 1080p and 1200p display of about 94/96 PPI. Not great, but the added desktop space is work it.
Mavericks was fine. Yosemite's passable, but I'm worried about that new font. Apple needs to remember that non-retina screens are the reality.
From the screenshots and reviews I've seen of the new font, it's better than the last one, but still inferior to Mavericks by quite a bit. If Apple designers are "unsure" how something will look on a Non-Retina screen, WTF don't they find out by testing it? Is there a Johnny Blind order that every Apple employee in every division MUST use a Retina display or something? It's absurd, but then they would have had to be blind to release Yosemite in the first place.
I installed Yosemite yesterday, and all I could think was, "What the hell were those guys at Apple thinking?".
Fonts = crap, hard to read
menus = crap, too light, too dark
dockbar = crap, a flat rectangle
For the love of god, allow users to turn off this gimmicky windows transparency. Instead, they offer a "reduced transparency" ? Really, "reduced" ? Is Apple so vane, they can't offer a OFF button?
This transparency crap reminds me too much of Vista.
And every time the OS boots, it shows a progress bar, like the OS needs an update or something. Ridiculous. Sure, it needs an update, like a brain transplant.
Final impression = crap
Fonts = crap, hard to read
menus = crap, too light, too dark
dockbar = crap, a flat rectangle
For the love of god, allow users to turn off this gimmicky windows transparency. Instead, they offer a "reduced transparency" ? Really, "reduced" ? Is Apple so vane, they can't offer a OFF button?
This transparency crap reminds me too much of Vista.
And every time the OS boots, it shows a progress bar, like the OS needs an update or something. Ridiculous. Sure, it needs an update, like a brain transplant.
Final impression = crap
Update for YosemiteRevert users
Just received this notice of a new version from the young man at Apple Club:
I installed it without any apparent problems.
(Remember that, in addition to the aesthetic reversions ala Mavericks, it includes the reversion of the system font to Lucida Grande, which gave me significant relief from the eye fatigue and headaches caused by Yosemite.)
https://sites.google.com/site/appleclubfhs/downloads/yosemiterevert-info
Etan
Just received this notice of a new version from the young man at Apple Club:
I installed it without any apparent problems.
(Remember that, in addition to the aesthetic reversions ala Mavericks, it includes the reversion of the system font to Lucida Grande, which gave me significant relief from the eye fatigue and headaches caused by Yosemite.)
https://sites.google.com/site/appleclubfhs/downloads/yosemiterevert-info
Etan
There must be something wrong with your Flavours, Graham. Your Lion theme should have a more Mavericks-like toolbar gradient, stop light buttons, top menu bar, and dropdown menus (ignore the font, thats something else). Something like this
Lion - Refined (variants) with the second Sneak Peek of Flavours2
My screenshot with that post showed the dark variant.
I guess, that was probably not the same variant.
The Flavours interface to variations may be easily overlooked, especially if you began with a flavour that offered no variant.
My screenshot with that post showed the dark variant.
I guess, that was probably not the same variant.
The Flavours interface to variations may be easily overlooked, especially if you began with a flavour that offered no variant.
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