May 6, 2010

How To Change Mouse Cursor In Ubuntu 10.04/11.04 When Compiz Is Enabled

This bug is not fixed from Ubuntu 9.10 then fixed in 10.10 and now is back in 11.04.
The problem is when you change cursor theme it doesn't change if you have compiz turned on,
It changes but it is only visible in some applications (firefox).

If compiz is off then cursor theming works fine.



This instructions will fix this bug:


  1. Download cursor pack.
  2. Extract it as root to /usr/share/icons
  3. Edit as root the index.theme file located in usr/share/icons/default
  4. Change the line Inherits= to the name of your new icon theme



Logout and login back and cursor will be changed.

21 comments:

tyler said...

I wish this would get fixed, but this is a good fix for those who don't change their cursor often, which is probably most people.

Ohrer said...

Last time I see this bug was on Intrepid Ibex, long time ago...

Anonymous said...

It f***ing works!!! Gracias, loco!!!

Anonymous said...

thanks

Anonymous said...

I can't seem to change the theme of 10.04 at all... emerald just crashes... there doesn't seem to be a metacity theme program anymore.. this fix changes the mouse theme but I also want to change the size.. what happened to all the customization?

Anonymous said...

Alternatively, and without root permissions, you can do this in the home folder per user:

1. Open 'Appearance'

2. Click Install and choose the cursor tar package you downloaded. It should give you a 'Theme Installed Successfully.' Click 'Apply New Theme Now' and exit 'Appearance.'

3. Open your home folder and create a folder called 'default' in the folder /home/YOUR_USERID/.icons/

4. Go into the folder you just created and right click and create an empty file here. Open the file with gedit and past the line from the tip above '[Icon Theme] | Inherits=YOUR_ICON_THEME_FOLDER_NAME'

5. Save the file as 'index.theme'

6. Logout and log in. Presto!

Anonymous said...

Oh, for the above method in the /home folder, you will probably have to hit Ctrl-H to see the dot (.icons) folders in your /home directory. :)

Anonymous said...

Using either method you can avoid logging out and back in by going to the run dialog (Alt+F2), and running "compiz --replace".

Brandon said...

This still doesn't address how to change the size and keep it consistent. I can barely see the small icon on my desktop, so prefer having it rather large. In Firefox and what-not, its large, but when Im on the desktop, it goes back to being small.

Ivan said...

you can change cursor size in appearance menu. click customize o theme then on pointer tab and there you can change cursor size (if it is available for that cursor theme).

Anonymous said...

My cursor size does not change when compiz is enabled, even when adjusting the appearance menu.

Anonymous said...

Many thanks you guys, appreciate the help :)

Masen Furer said...

To those still experiencing this problem, a patch/fix has been posted on the ubuntu bug tracker. It seems like the Ubuntu devs don't think that this is a very big deal, so no one is fixing it...BUT, you can fix it yourself:

Check out these instructions:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/compiz/+bug/459647/comments/45

Ivan said...

Thanks Masen,

I can't believe that you can fix this by just renaming 3 lines of code ( by adding just .in)...

Anonymous said...

Whoaaa... nice guide! Worked for me! That little piece of mouse pointer was annoying me to no end. Now its nice and big and I actually see whats going on on the screen... yay!

Ivan said...

This has been fixed today on Ubuntu 10.10 Alpha 1

Anonymous said...

You may try gedit instead of vi:
sudo gedit compiz-0.8.4/debian/patches/013-add-cursor-theme-support.patch

Brandon said...

Jeez, sorry that posted 4 times. It was telling me that there was an error when I would post it. I had no idea it went through each time. I apologize.

I got it open with gedit immediately after posting the last comment in that barrage of duplicates (I don't know why I didn't think of gedit in the first place) and got past step 3, but it won't allow me to finish the process. I repackaged everything, and when I tried to install over compiz like it says to do, nothing happens.

Ivan said...

sorry but i can't help you. i didn't mess with this fix.

I think is is best to use this walkthrough and wait for ubuntu 10.10.

Unknown said...

thanks alot, this worked perfect. i remember having this problem before in another distro but it's been so long I completely forgot

Anonymous said...

Awesome! This worked! After 3 hours of trying other dumb fixes, I am now ready to move on to better things.

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