Failed to apply custom GTK icon theme, color theme, and cursor theme outside Demo mode

[asumbek]

Hello, I'm using regreet as greeter when booting NixOS. I have the following config to customize regreet.

  programs.regreet = {
    enable = true;
    theme = {
      name = "Lounge-night-compact";
      package = pkgs.lounge-gtk-theme;
    };
    cursorTheme = {
      name = "catppuccin-mocha-yellow-cursors";
      package = pkgs.catppuccin-cursors.mochaYellow;
    };
    iconTheme = {
      name = "Lounge-aux";
      package = pkgs.buildEnv {
        name = "regreet-icons";
        paths = with pkgs; [
          adwaita-icon-theme
          lounge-gtk-theme
        ];
      };
    };
    settings = {
      background = {
        path = ../resources/regreet-wallpaper.png;
        fit = "Contain";
      };
    };
  };

The following works in Demo mode. But when I tried it when logging in, it doesn't work at all.

[max-ishere]

A couple of questions:

1. Does regreet start fine with greetd, just isn't themed?
2. Is the demo mode run by the user who has their GTK already themed?

[max-ishere]

The only thing I can think of is that the theme name may have to be changed. You can obtain the correct name by opening the GTK inspector.

https://developer.gnome.org/documentation/tools/inspector.html

[asumbek]

1. Does regreet start fine with greetd, just isn't themed?

Yes, it does work fine.

2. Is the demo mode run by the user who has their GTK already themed?

Yes, the user has a GTK applied theme.

[asumbek]

In the inspector, it shows that it's using the Default GTK theme.

Maybe because Lounge isn't installed on user's system.

[max-ishere]

The dropdown should have a couple of options there, try switching between them and find the value that is the theme name.

The options may include the cursor theme, icon theme, etc. (Bruh gtk, for some reason you can set a cursor theme name as a coloscheme).

Anyways if the theme name in the dropdown matches the nix config, it should work.

[max-ishere]

On my NixOS system, when I run regreet as max-ishere the GTK theme is applied from the user's settings (Cosmic DE look) but when I switch to the real greeter, the app starts in the default white GTK look and applies the theme from the config after half a second.

[asumbek]

The theme isn't listed in the dropdown.

I found out the theme doesn't support Gtk 4, so I switched to another theme.

[alfonsovinti]

Hi, same problem here on Arch.

Config file:

[background]
path = "/home/me/.config/wallpapers/brown_city_planet.jpg"
fit = "Contain"

[GTK]
application_prefer_dark_theme = true
font_name = "Pixel Code 14"
icon_theme_name = "Colloid-Yellow-Gruvbox-Dark"
theme_name = "Colloid-Yellow-Dark-Gruvbox"

Everything seems to be working correctly, but outside of demo mode, neither the theme, nor the background, nor the font are applied.

Log:

Click to expand

• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.904889896+02:00 INFO regreet::tomlutils: Loaded TOML file: /etc/greetd/regreet.toml
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905114354+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: NormalUser { uid_min: 1000, uid_max: 60000 }
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905147454+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: Found user 'me' with UID '1000' and empty full name
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905471146+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: Checking session directory: /usr/share/xsessions
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905488852+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: Checking session directory: /usr/share/wayland-sessions
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905508243+02:00 INFO regreet::sysutil: Now scanning session file: /usr/share/wayland-sessions/hyprland-uwsm.desktop
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905954246+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: Found name 'Hyprland (uwsm-managed)' for session '/usr/share/wayland-sessions/hyprland-uwsm.desktop' with command '["uwsm", "start", "--", "hyprland.desktop"]'
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.905966959+02:00 INFO regreet::sysutil: Now scanning session file: /usr/share/wayland-sessions/hyprland.desktop
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.906119504+02:00 DEBUG regreet::sysutil: Found name 'Hyprland' for session '/usr/share/wayland-sessions/hyprland.desktop' with command '["Hyprland"]'
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.906141416+02:00 INFO regreet::tomlutils: Loaded TOML file: /var/lib/regreet/state.toml
• 2025-04-01T14:09:49.910429799+02:00 INFO regreet::client: Cancelling greetd session
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.304778036+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Setting dark theme: true
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.313775635+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Setting font: Pixel Code 14
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.313797346+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Setting icon theme: Colloid-Yellow-Gruvbox-Dark
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.313799815+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Setting theme: Colloid-Yellow-Dark-Gruvbox
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.322693663+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Found user: me
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.322798483+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Found session: Hyprland
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.322836794+02:00 DEBUG regreet::gui::component: Found session: Hyprland (uwsm-managed)
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.322885576+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=UserChanged(UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: None, sess_text: "" }) component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}: regreet::gui::component: Got input message: UserChanged(UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: None, sess_text: "" })
• 2025-04-01T14:09:50.322889938+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=UserChanged(UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: None, sess_text: "" }) component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:user_change_handler: regreet::gui::model: Retrieved username 'me' from options
• 2025-04-01T14:09:58.831538252+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}: regreet::gui::component: Got input message: Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } }
• 2025-04-01T14:09:58.831574948+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Retrieved username 'me' from options
• 2025-04-01T14:09:58.831583007+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Creating session for user: me
• 2025-04-01T14:09:58.831588856+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::client: Creating session for username: me
• 2025-04-01T14:09:58.860141719+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: greetd asks for a secret auth input: Password:
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.685535871+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}: regreet::gui::component: Got input message: Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } }
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.685572178+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::client: Sending password to greetd
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707661624+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Successfully logged in; starting session
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707671481+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Retrieved current session: Hyprland (uwsm-managed)
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707674284+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Retrieved username 'me' from options
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707677025+02:00 DEBUG update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Updated cache with current user: me
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707678295+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Saving cache to disk
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707683123+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::cache: Saving cache to disk
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707766564+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::client: Starting greetd session with command: ["uwsm", "start", "--", "hyprland.desktop"]
• 2025-04-01T14:10:01.707922075+02:00 INFO update_with_view{input=Login { info: UserSessInfo { user_id: Some("me"), user_text: "", sess_id: Some("Hyprland (uwsm-managed)"), sess_text: "" } } component="regreet::gui::model::Greeter" id="0x7fff39ea0688"}:login_click_handler: regreet::gui::model: Session successfully started

[medanimohamedakram]

For this issue, I'm using hyprland as the loader of regreet, so I set all the theme related stuff using hyprland.conf file
As for the background, I found that it's related to the user priviliges, usually we use the greeter user, so put the background in a path that the greeter user has access to i.e (it doesn't have access to your home directory), you can put it for example in /usr/share/wallpapers

[rharish101]

Sorry for missing this issue. @alfonsovinti The missing background seems to be a permissions issue, as @medanimohamedakram says. As for the GTK settings, perhaps it's a similar issue.

To diagnose this, please try running demo mode as the greeter user, with sudo -u greeter regreet --demo. If you get an error like "Authorization required, but no authorization protocol specified", then run xhost si:localuser:greeter to grant the greeter user access, then rerun the previous demo mode command.

If you can't see the theme as the greeter user in demo mode but you can see it as your normal user in demo mode, then it's certainly a permissions issue: the greeter user can't read the theme files. Please check how you installed the theme, font, etc.: they should ideally be installed through pacman (or a wrapper).