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There are plenty of GNOME Shell themes with transparent panels, and I might want a transparent window border / titlebar theme to go with it. The closest thing I can think of is Emerald, but that only works with Compiz AFAIK and GNOME Shell only works with Mutter.

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11.10 or 12.04?? LOOK at this ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=11453890 –  Ringtail Mar 8 '12 at 0:12
@BlueXrider That's for Unity's panel; it's definitely not what I'm looking for. I'm using 11.10 btw, but an answer that would be applicable to 12.04 as well would be nice. –  Christopher Kyle Horton Mar 8 '12 at 0:15
Here is the theme you were looking for: gnome-look.org/content/show.php/… –  digital illusion Dec 5 at 0:23

2 Answers 2

Since the release of Ubuntu 12.10, gconf-editor has been officially replaced by dconf-editor. So the answer by Ringtail will not work.

To enable Window Titlebar transparency in Ubuntu 12 onwards:

  1. Open a Terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T)
  2. Copy and Paste the following line:

    sudo apt-get install dconf-tools
  3. Press Enter and install the package.
  4. Once installed, run dconf-editor in the terminal.
  5. Navigate to org/compiz/gwd
  6. Now change the values of the following to anything between 0 and 1:

  7. Now you've changed the transparency of the Window Titlebars.
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You can change the window border transparency using the gconf-editor. You can change the window transparency for all the window borders or for active window borders. To change the window borders transperancy you need to have the gconf-editor installed.

To install the gconf-editor open a terminal window (press Ctrl+Alt+T) and copy+paste the following line:

sudo apt-get install gconf-editor

To start the gconf-editor press Alt+F2 and type: gconf-editor.

When the configuration editor is open click on apps -> gwd and change the value of the metacity_theme_active_opacity and the metacity_theme_opacity to a value lower then 1.0. To change a value all you have to do is double click on the name and change the value in the edit key window.

metacity_theme_active_opacity: changes transperancy for active window borders

metacity_theme_opacity: changes transperancy for all window borders


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Sorry, but this doesn't work for me, even after logging out and doing a reboot. I think gconf is supposed to be deprecated in favor of dconf, anyway. –  Christopher Kyle Horton Mar 8 '12 at 3:00
I will keep an eye out for a better way –  Ringtail Mar 8 '12 at 3:53
The answer 1 works fine. –  Hanynowsky Mar 14 '12 at 12:26
@Hanynowsky Mark as approved the answer that worked for you. –  Gediminas Jeremiah Gudelis Aug 18 '13 at 14:05
@GediminasJeremiahGudelis I already voted it up! The poster of this question is not me but WarriorIng64 –  Hanynowsky Aug 19 '13 at 15:49

protected by Community Mar 24 '13 at 17:26


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