Thursday, January 24, 2013

cursor inconsistency solved (partially) in ubuntu 12.04

One of the problem i found in +Ubuntu 12.04 was the cursor inconsistency. Previously, ubuntu used to provide options for controlling every little aspect of the distro. In the present LTS however, this is not the default option! Though with the help of +Ubuntu Tweak, it is even now possible ; a little more extra steps! :(
But even after all these steps to change the  cursor theme, there are inconsistencies. The changed cursor will only be visible in +Mozilla Firefox and few other apps but not on the desktop (where the default DMZ-white cursor will remain) . May be this is because of compiz - only people at +Ubuntu Development could tell this confidently.
However after going through few searches, i found that its possible to change the cursor on the desktop from the defult DMZ-white to the cursor theme of choice.
After selecting the desired cursor them at the ubuntu tweak, the following command should be entered into the terminal (ctrl+alt+T)
sudo gedit /usr/share/icons/default/index.theme
and then change the name present after the "=" sign to the name of the cursor theme.
As i am using the ComixCursors-Orange-Huge theme presently, the index.theme file of mine is looking like this -
Inherits=ComixCursors-Orange-Huge
Save it and reboot the machine (not sure if logging out and logging in will work or not). After the reboot, the inconsistency across the different windows will stop and the same cursor will appear everywhere.
But still it is not a full solution; because when the cursor size is changed,  size discrepancy will creep in. The changed size will appear in few applications like firefox, but the default size will stay in desktop and some other apps  ( +Chromium sometimes show changed size and other times the default size; don't know the reason. may be +Chromium Developers could put some light on it).
This particular problem with cursor exists in ubuntu since 2007; but ubuntu developers probably don't think it as an important problem! Sad for us users; what else to say!
P.S. this post is for back up purpose only; so that i could follow it easily after future ubuntu updates; not taking any responsibilities for the possible harm in pc's.

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