Schemes For Linux

If you're into GNOME and GTK development, then Schemes is definitely one tool that should catch your interest.

Schemes is a unique app that allows you to create syntax highlighting style schemes for a wide range of GtkSourceView-based apps and platforms. For a bit of context, "GtkSourceView is a GNOME library that GtkTextView, the standard GTK+ widget for multiline text editing."

In short, one can think of GtkSourceView as being a pretty decent source code editor. It adds support for syntax highlighting, undo/redo actions, file loading and saving, search and replace, a comprehensive completion system, printing, and line number displaying, just to name a few.

Since it's free and open-source, it's aimed at both beginner users who want to experiment with GtkSourceView development and more advanced GNOME developers who aim to improve their productivity.

In short, it's aimed at pretty much anyone looking to edit GtkSourceView style schemes for any GNOME app or platform. What's great about this app is that it also be used to modify already existing schemes.

This is a good time to point out that style schemes created with the utility can be used with GtkSourceView 5.3 and even never (it requires support for the <metadata> element). If you are willing to remove the <metadata> element, then the schemes could potentially work with older versions of GtkSourceView as well.

For such a specialized application, Schemes really does look amazing. The app boasts a GTK4/Libadwaita graphical user interface that's split into three main, self-explanatory sections: General, Color Palette, and Styles.

Another great aspect of Schemes is the surprising amount of customization options on tap. From the Settings section, you can add and remove background patterns, you can activate or deactivate text wrapping, insert spaces, enable snippets, as well as see the document type. What's more, you also get two GUI themes (Dark and Light).

There's no doubt that Schemes is a pretty niche app, and considering that Linux in general (hence GNOME as well) has a relatively small market share, most people probably don't even know of its existence.

It's a very capable and nicely designed application that does exactly its job right. It provides you with a stylish and functional environment for either creating style schemas for GtkSourceView-based apps or editing already existing ones.