Jim Laurent's Weblog

As a longtime Mac user (and someone who is 100% Microsoft free at home and work) it's important to me to be able to have a common user interface as I move from home to work.  When Sun first introduced Gnome in Solaris this caused a problem because the look and feel was too much like windows for my taste and after years of MacOS and CDE usage it was really annoying to close a window in the upper right corner instead of upper left where God and Steve Jobs  intended the close box to be.

I use this setup on my Solaris 10 based Sun Ray ultra-thin client at the office as well as my Acer Ferrari 3400 laptop.

Thanks to some Gnome theme hackers, I can now have a MacOS look and feel with window widgets where they belong.  Get the theme and icons at: http://www.gnome-look.org/content/show.php?content=13548

Don't forget the most important step:

• start gconf by typing: gconf-editor and hitting enter.
• This program is a bit like the registry editor for windows.
• In the tree on the left you need to go to /apps/metacity/general/
• There is then a key in the right pane called "button_layout"
• edit this key so that it reads:
• close,minimize,maximize
  

Why should you care?

If you are a MacOS and Solaris user, this will maximize your productivity by providing a more familiar user interaction.  I also enjoy the confused looks I get when I open up my hot, red Ferrari laptop, boot Solaris and login to a Mac like desktop.