GTK

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GTK is a toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces. It is part of the GNU Project and maintained by GNOME.

Installation

Though GTK can be installed with the emerge command, it will usually be pulled in as a dependency by an ebuild.

If installing external software on Gentoo that requires GTK, write an ebuild to manage the installation of that software with it's GTK dependency.

GTK-2 and GTK-3

GTK-2 and GTK-3, are provided by the x11-libs/gtk+ package.

Some applications may optionally be built with support for a GTK interface when enabling the gtk USE flag.

There are also gtk2 and gtk3 USE flags.

USE flags

USE flags for x11-libs/gtk+ Gimp ToolKit +

+X	Add support for X11
+introspection	Add support for GObject based introspection
aqua	Include support for the Mac OS X Aqua (Carbon/Cocoa) GUI
broadway	Enable the GDK Broadway backend
cloudproviders	Enable GtkPlacesSidebar to access cloud services
colord	Use x11-misc/colord for color management in printing
cups	Add support for CUPS (Common Unix Printing System)
examples	Install examples, usually source code
gtk-doc	Build and install gtk-doc based developer documentation for dev-util/devhelp, IDE and offline use
sysprof	Enable profiling data capture support using dev-util/sysprof-capture
test	Enable dependencies and/or preparations necessary to run tests (usually controlled by FEATURES=test but can be toggled independently)
vim-syntax	Pulls in related vim syntax scripts
wayland	Enable dev-libs/wayland backend
xinerama	Add support for querying multi-monitor screen geometry through the Xinerama API

Data provided by the Gentoo Package Database · Last update: 2024-12-21 17:16 More information about USE flags

GTK-4

GTK-4 is provided by gui-libs/gtk, a separate package.

The gtk4 USE flag is provided by packages that have optional GTK-4 support.

USE flags

USE flags for gui-libs/gtk GTK is a multi-platform toolkit for creating graphical user interfaces

+X	Add support for X11
+introspection	Add support for GObject based introspection
aqua	Include support for the Mac OS X Aqua (Carbon/Cocoa) GUI
broadway	Enable the GDK Broadway backend.
cloudproviders	Enable GtkPlacesSidebar to access cloud services
colord	Use x11-misc/colord for color management in printing
cups	Add support for CUPS (Common Unix Printing System)
examples	Install examples, usually source code
ffmpeg	Enable ffmpeg/libav-based audio/video codec support
gstreamer	Add support for media-libs/gstreamer (Streaming media)
sysprof	Enable profiling data capture support using dev-util/sysprof-capture
test	Enable dependencies and/or preparations necessary to run tests (usually controlled by FEATURES=test but can be toggled independently)
vulkan	Add support for 3D graphics and computing via the Vulkan cross-platform API
wayland	Enable dev-libs/wayland backend

Data provided by the Gentoo Package Database · Last update: 2025-01-05 00:32 More information about USE flags

Additional software

  Important note to editors

This section currently is just a stub with a few examples of packages, please complete it with more useful content.

Search packages.gentoo.org for packages to use with GTK, such as themes or language bindings.

Themes

• x11-themes/arc-theme - flat theme with transparent elements for GTK 2/3/4

Development tools

• Cambalache - RAD tool for GTK4 and GTK3
• dev-util/gnome-builder - Integrated Development Environment for GNOME
• dev-util/glade - RAD tool for GTK3, unmaintained

Language bindings

• dev-libs/gjs - Javascript bindings for GNOME
• dev-cpp/gtkmm - C++ interface for GTK
• dev-python/pygobject - Python bindings for GObject based libraries such as GTK

Configuration

The following programs can be used to change the appearance of applications using the GTK toolkit:

• lxde-base/lxappearance - part of the LXDE desktop environment, works for GTK 2 apps also (dark theme). Or manually edit ~/.gtkrc-2.0

User dark theme

GTK 3

FILE ~/.config/gtk-3.0/settings.ini

[Settings]
gtk-application-prefer-dark-theme = true

GTK 4

FILE ~/.bashrc

export GTK_THEME=Adwaita-dark

System-wide dark theme

GTK 3

FILE /etc/gtk-3.0/settings.ini

[Settings]
gtk-application-prefer-dark-theme = true

Troubleshooting

Mouse scrolling doesn't work

With the gtk-3 applications under fvwm or other window manager / desktop environments, mouse scrolling sometime doesn't work as it should or at all. At the same time, it work with the applications using other toolkit environments like Qt, which imply this is not a system or Xorg configuration issue. To fix that issue, to add the following environmental variable should work, as example:

FILE ~/.bashrc

export GDK_CORE_DEVICE_EVENTS=1

For more information, see GTK applications (sometimes?) do not scroll correctly, lacks focus?.

See also

• GNOME — a feature-rich desktop environment provided by the GNOME project.

External resources

• x11-libs/wxGTK - GTK version of wxWidgets, a cross-platform C++ GUI toolkit