OpenRiot v7.7 — Color Theory for People Who Hate Color Theory
“The bar should look like it knows what it’s doing, not like a Christmas tree that lost an argument with a gamma ray.” — The OpenRiot Crew, after staring at polybar for ten hours
Release Overview
v7.7 is the release where we stopped pretending a blinding white polybar was “clean minimalism.” It was just lazy. Every module was shouting at the same volume. The focused workspace, the volume icon, the date, and a random separator dot all competed for your retina’s attention like seagulls fighting over a french fry. We fixed that.
Polybar Color Hierarchy — The entire bar now has visual priority. Focused
workspaces pop in blue (#7aa2f7). Unfocused workspaces recede into dark blue
(#344b7a). System-status modules — volume, battery, HDMI — sit in a new
intermediate color (#8aa2f0) that bridges the bright cyan of the update
icon and the violet of settings/power. The network/stealth group got
cyan-dim (#5a95b8), 20% darker, so it no longer screams at the same level
as the date. Even the separator dot was dimmed to #32374c. The bar finally
has hierarchy: you see the active workspace first, system status second,
everything else third.
Ethernet Icon Always Visible — Unplugging your cable used to make the
ethernet icon vanish entirely. Now it shows when disconnected and when
active. You know the adapter exists even when the cable doesn’t. The
underlying getEthInterface() tracks the last-seen interface instead of
returning ("", false) on inactive carrier, so phantom em0 interfaces on
ThinkPads still stay hidden while real USB ethernet adapters remain
discoverable.
Dead Code Excision — The polybar config had an orphaned [module/i3] block
with label-focused, label-unfocused, and label-urgent lines indented under
the wrong module for multiple releases. They did nothing. The actual workspace
display comes from --polybar-all ([module/all]). We removed the corpse.
Release Path Checker Date Fix — The hardcoded release date was May 19, 2026
(the OpenBSD.org announcement date). sysupgrade compares against the release
set build date, which is May 6, 2026. A May 14 snapshot was misclassified as
pre-release when it was actually post-release. We corrected the threshold and
centralized it into a single ReleaseDate variable in version.go. Next
release: one-line change.
GNOME Text Editor Font — Downsized from 13 to 11. On 1080p screens this is legible without eating half your display. If you’re on 1440p+ and want 13, you know where the settings are.
🧾 Files Changed
| File | Nature of Change |
|---|---|
config/polybar/config.ini |
New colors intermediate, cyan-dim; cleanup |
source/polybar/polybar.go |
Workspace colors: focused blue, unfocused dark |
source/network/network.go |
Tracks last eth iface; icon always shown |
source/installer/version.go |
ReleaseDate var; extracted helper func |
source/commands/helpers.go |
Uses installer.ReleaseDate for path checks |
source/installer/version_test.go |
Tests use ReleaseDate; mock removed |
config/dconf/org.gnome.TextEditor.ini |
Font size: 13 → 11 |
README.md |
Migration table dates updated to May 6, 2026 |
docs/v7.6-Release-Notes.md |
Release Path Checker bullet updated |
🎵 What We’re Listening To
Same playlist. Same questionable Theremin solo in the “Cyberpunk” folder. But now the polybar has chromatic hierarchy, which is honestly more satisfying than it should be. Your eyes no longer dart around the bar like a moth in a lighthouse. The active workspace is the lighthouse. Everything else is the ocean.
🗣️ Final Words
“White is not a color. It is the absence of a decision.” — The OpenRiot Crew, after finally picking a blue
v7.7 is the release where the bar stopped yelling at you. The focused workspace is blue. The unfocused workspaces are dark blue. The volume icon is a muted blue-violet. The network group is a dimmed cyan. The separator is basically invisible. This is not decoration. This is information design. Every color choice communicates state.
Your ethernet cable is unplugged. You still know the port exists. Your screen
is 1080p. Your text editor font is appropriately sized. Your snapshot is
post-release. sysupgrade -R would downgrade. The bar told you all of this
without saying a word.
— The OpenRiot Crew
“Your desktop should inform, not perform.”