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Themes and Theme Editor

Every colour, font and size in AetherSDR comes from the active theme. You can switch themes live, with no restart, and create your own in the built-in Theme Editor.

Choosing a theme​

View → Theme lists every installed theme, with a check mark on the active one:

  • Default Dark: the standard look, and the default.
  • Default Light: a light theme for bright rooms.
  • Any themes you have created or imported.

The change applies immediately across the whole application.

Using the Theme Editor​

View → Theme Editor… opens the editor for the active theme. It is a normal window, so you can keep it open while you look at the result. The controls are listed under Reference.

Edits are saved as you make them.

Built-in themes are protected​

Default Dark and Default Light can't be changed, renamed or deleted. When you edit a built-in theme, the editor asks you to Save As a copy (suggested name "My <theme name>") and your changes go there. Deleting the theme you are using switches back to Default Dark.

Sharing theme files​

  • Exported themes use the .aethertheme extension (a JSON file). Import from file… accepts .aethertheme and .json, and you can also drag a theme file onto the editor window.
  • Your own themes are stored in a themes folder inside the AetherSDR configuration folder (on Linux, ~/.config/AetherSDR/themes/). A user theme with the same name as a built-in one is ignored, so use Save As with a new name.

What a theme controls​

Themes cover the whole interface, including:

  • Slice colours: the default colours for slices A–H (see Slice Colors).
  • Waterfall colour schemes: the palettes chosen under the panadapter's Display → Scheme (see Panadapter Controls). Switching theme or scheme recolours the waterfall already on screen, including scrollback.
  • The 7- and 14-segment display fonts used for frequency readouts (the DSEG fonts, under the SIL Open Font License).

Analog meter faces have their own Face theme choice on each meter (see Meters).

Reference​

ControlWhat it does
Scope:Which part of the interface you are editing. "(root)" is the whole application; a nested scope (for example one applet) applies your change only inside that container.
🎯 InspectClick it, then point at any part of the main window to find the tokens that paint it. Esc cancels.
Filter tokens…Narrows the token list (for example accent, slice, meter).
Token editorsChange colours (with transparency), gradients, fonts and sizes. Changes show live.
Clear overridePuts one token back to the theme's value.
Theme actionsRename theme…, Delete theme…, Export to file…, Import from file….
Save As…Saves the current edits as a new theme.

Theme authors can find the token names and their meanings in the repository:

Contributors writing new interface code take every colour from theme tokens rather than hard-coded values; see Contributing Guide.

Known issues​

  • The Theme Editor's token list can draw light text on white rows, so tokens such as font.family.freq are hard to read (#5934).

Troubleshooting​

Import says the theme matches a built-in theme name​

The theme file's "name" field is Default Dark or Default Light. Built-in names are reserved, and a user theme with one of them is ignored.

  1. Open the theme file in a text editor and change its "name" field to a new name.
  2. Import it again with Theme actions → Import from file….

Your edits to Default Dark or Default Light went into a new theme​

Built-in themes are protected, so the editor saved your changes to a copy named "My <theme name>".

  1. Pick the copy from View → Theme to use it.
  2. Rename it with Theme actions → Rename theme… if you like.

See also​