Clicking top right corner to close window-XFCE

[GreekWatchmaker]

@chrlyc

Thanks for your message @GreekWatchmaker.
What is the browser that you're using on that screenshot ?
How did you install it ?

Well, since you found the answer already, this will be a little bit dated, but that was just Google Chrome there that I installed from the Synaptic package manager, if I remember correctly. Firefox would not highlight the X, interestingly enough.

But, this isn't something I ever would have noticed anyway. I never full screen my applications. I have this stupid habit of having a main window open, usually my browser, and then I'll place new windows in locations where an edge is peaking out from behind the browser so I can click on it to bring it to the front. I'm all about inefficiency!

[Aravisian]

@Dave

Any suggestions on how to get ALL programs to implement the same fix? (I have Zorin OS 15.3 Lite.)

Yes, you must change the XFWM theme.
Navigate to the Theme you are using, the to XFWM4 directory.
In themerc, change:

button_spacing=0
button_offset=0

Open the Image files for
top-right-active
top-right-inactive
right-active
right-inactive
in Gimp.
From image on the menubar, select Canvas Resize and shrink the WIDTH ONLY (make sure to click the UNLINK icon) on each of the above files.
Once done properly, go to File, then down where export "overwrite as..."

When the above is done, it will shrink the right edge up to the corner of the screen.

[Aravisian]

@Dave

Edit 2: Well, maybe that wasn't the correct location. Apparently I don't have permissions to modify the images in /usr/share/themes. (I'm still an absolute Linux newbie, so any guidance would be appreciated.)

sudo -i

nautilus

Anytime you move to change any file in ROOT, you must elevate your File Manager to Root Permissions.

[Aravisian]

@Dave

Thanks. I used sudo -i thunar

I am sorry. I have been mostly fronting Gnome issues, especially since Zorin OS 16 was released. I was on auto-pilot when I typed Nautilus.

@Dave

I changed all 4 .png files using the Canvas Size feature, from 9 pixels to 1 pixel. Then overwrote the images, and rebooted. But I don't see any difference in the window icons, and pointing my mouse at the top-right corner of the screen still doesn't highlight the X button to close the window.

This is odd... I had tested this on my own copy before making the suggestion, just to be sure it would work.
Let me try testing it again just to see what went wrong...

@Dave

Using a different approach, if I switch to the theme called "default-hdpi", then pointing at the top-right corner of the screen DOES highlight the close button, but that new theme wasn't applied to all programs. For example, Document Viewer, Firefox, and gEdit all look the same as if they are still on the ZorinGrey-Dark theme.

CSD applications (Gnome apps) will not display the same as the others because Gnome did away with and removed the Window management and titlebars since they decided we don't need them and don't need user control or choice in the matter, either.
You can patch this by using PCMan's gtk3-nocsd package which breaks the gnomish CSD and forces windows to use the proper window manager.

sudo apt install gtk3-nocsd

Must reboot to see the effect.
This will affect all apps run from Home Level, but not root.
In the meantime, let me see what I can do with the Zorin Theme again.

[Aravisian]

@Dave

I installed PCMan's gtk3-nocsd package, which seemed to work. Now all applications have the theme that was selected in Window Manager. However, it does that by adding a whole new titlebar at the top, which takes up a lot more space at the top than before. I generally prefer to maximize my window content-viewing space, so this is not ideal. (And it leaves the old titlebar, so now I have 2 titlebars in Firefox.) See these screenshots to show what I mean.

That is happening in Firefox because Firefox was taught by Gnome it has to manage the Window Management since Gnome refuses to do it anymore.
Open Firefox and tell it that it no longer has to.
Click the Hamburger Icon
More Tools>
Customize Toolbar
At the very, very bottom is a checkbox for Titlebar and it should have no check mark on it. Check that to ON. That is the setting for "Use System Title Bars".

That will solve your problem.

@Dave

Thank for offering to help figure this out! Could there be multiple locations where there are a set of Zorin theme images, and maybe I modified the wrong images?

No... it's mostly all in one place except... If you are using Snap Packages or Flatpak packages. Anything installed with those will not follow your standard theme.
Zorin does have Flatpak'ed themes - so you may have cases where a flatpak is using that, instead of your system theme.
The best way to know is; check if you see a difference between apps- like the one in Firefox you noted above.
Then check the source of those packages.