This tab contains settings that change the visual appearance of Ardour.

• Restore Defaults When clicked will change all settings on the Theme tab back to Ardour's default values.

• All floating windows are dialogs When enabled Ardour will use type "Dialog" for all floating windows instead of using type "Utility" for some of them. This may help usability with some window managers. This setting requires a restart of Ardour to take effect.

• Transient windows follow front window When enabled transient windows will follow the front window when toggling between the editor and mixer. This setting requires a restart of Ardour to take effect.

• Draw "flat" buttons When enabled button controls in the user interface will be drawn with a flat look. When disabled button controls will have a slight 3D appearance.

• Blink Rec-Arm buttons When enabled the record-armed buttons on tracks will blink when they are armed but not currently recording. When disabled the record-armed buttons on tracks will be outlined in red instead of blinking.

• Color regions using their track's color When enabled the background color of regions in the editor will be displayed using the the color assigned to the track. When disabled the default region background color will be used.

• Show waveform clipping When enabled the waveform displayed will show peaks marked in red if they exceed the clip level. The Waveform Clip Level is set with a slider on the Preferences Editor tab

• Icon Set Changes the mouse cursor icons used to indicate different tool modes in the editor. An example would be the icons used to indicate whether the cursor will select a region or change the length of a region.

• Waveforms color gradient depth Determines how much gradient effect is applied to audio waveforms displayed in the editor. Values range from 0.00, no gradient effect, to 0.95, maximum effect.

• Timeline item gradient depth Determines how much gradient effect is applied to the backgrounds of regions displayed in the editor. Values range from 0.00, no gradient effect, to 0.95, maximum effect.

• Colors The color of an item in the user interface is determined by which named color is assigned to it, the color displayed for each named color in the palette, and in some cases, the transparency of stacked items.

  • Items Each display item has a named color assigned to it from the palette. Example color names are "meter color9" and "color 4".

    Click on an item's color example to change the named color choice.

  • Palette Hover over a color to display it's name. Click on a color to open a color chooser dialog.

  • Transparency Some items have a transparency value. Transparency can be changed from opaque to totally transparent.