Transparent HUD?

Franko_Burolo · 2 April 2018 18:51

I was wandering if there was a way to make the HUD a bit transparent, so that we can see what happens in the application underneath it. I suppose it’s doable only with hardware compositing, so either with Compton or Compiz enabled. I am using Compiz ATM, so a Compiz-based solution would be preferable, but a Compton one would be just as welcome. Thanks!

I was thinking about Opacity, Brightness and Saturation plugin in CCSM, but I can’t figure how to identify mate-hud windows in it… Any idea?

Hmm… Now that I’ve finished writing this, I wonder if I should put transparent HUD as a feature proposal…

vkareh · 2 April 2018 20:55

You should definitely propose this as a feature request. Marco should also be able to do compositing and transparencies just fine, so whatever solution would probably work just fine on either window manager

Franko_Burolo · 2 April 2018 21:43

Seems like I got this in Compiz, somewhat…

In CCSM > Opacity, Brightness and Saturation > Opacity I put an opacity of 85% on window type=Unknown. And it works!

I figured this by noticing the HUD uses the same open animation as normal windows do, so I looked up at the Animations settings looking for identifiers I am not already familiar with, that use the same open animation as type=Normal windows. Seems like “Unknown” was what I was looking for.

The downside of this approach is that this Compiz plugin makes both background and text equally transparent, so one has to be careful to put some reasonable setting to keep it readable or even visible at all, not even blur will help here. So 85% opacity works for me. I put the same for class=Brisk-menu, too. IDK, but this way it seems they both feel somewhat more at home in Mutiny layout.

I’ll propose this as a feature request.

EDIT 16.03.2018: Another downside of this solution is that mpv and Steam windows also become transparent (so far, maybe there’s more of them). Obviously, Compiz sees them as type=Unknown windows, too. This is just a minor annoyance, really, as reopcifying them is as easy as a key stroke + a mouse scroll, but still…