How to install the Inverse icon theme on Linux
Inverse is a circular icon theme, similar to Numix Circle and other circular Linux icon themes. What makes Inverse stand out is that it does a great job incorporating modern design to its icons that give it a professional look. Here’s how to get Inverse working on your Linux PC.
Download Inverse on Linux
To download the latest release of the Inverse icon theme on your Linux PC, do the following. First, head over to the Inverse Gnome-look.org page. Then, find the “Files” tab, and click on it. Look through the “Files” tab to download the Inverse icon theme version you would like to install on your PC.
Extracting Inverse on Linux
The Inverse icon theme is distributed via Gnome-look.org in a compressed TarXZ archive. Icon themes will not work on Linux unless they are loose files, so we must demonstrate how to extract the contents of the archive before continuing.
To start the extraction process, open up a terminal window by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard. Once you have the terminal window open, use the CD command to move into the “Downloads” directory.
Once inside the “Downloads” directory, follow the command-line extraction instructions outlined below to get your Inverse icon theme files decompressed from the TarXZ archive.
cd ~/Downloads
Inverse Red
To extract Inverse Red, run the following command.
tar xvf Inverse-red.tar.xz
Inverse Purple
To decompress Inverse Purple, run the command below.
tar xvf Inverse-purple.tar.xz
Inverse Pink
Need to extract Inverse Pink? Run the following command.
tar xvf Inverse-pink.tar.xz
Inverse Orange
To get Inverse Orange decompressed, run the command below.
tar xvf Inverse-orange.tar.xz
Inverse Grey
To extract Inverse Grey, run the following command.
tar xvf Inverse-grey.tar.xz
Inverse Green
To get your hands on Inverse Green, run the extraction command below.
tar xvf Inverse-green.tar.xz
Inverse Brown
To extract Inverse Brown, run the following command.
tar xvf Inverse-brown.tar.xz
Inverse Blue
To extract Inverse Blue, run the command below.
tar xvf Inverse-blue.tar.xz
Inverse Black
To decompress Inverse Black, run the following command.
tar xvf Inverse-black.tar.xz
Inverse
To extract the Inverse archive, run the command below.
tar xvf Inverse.tar.xz
Once the files are decompressed, you will see “Inverse” folders appear in your “Downloads” directory. These folders contain the icon files you will need to install to use the Inverse icon theme. From here, move on to the next section of the guide.
Installing Inverse on Linux
It is possible to install the Inverse icon theme in two ways on Linux. The first way is known as single-user, which only gives the person who sets up the theme access. The second way is system-wide, which makes the theme available to all users of the system.
In this guide, we will cover both installation methods for Inverse. To get started, launch a terminal window by pressing Ctrl + Alt + T or Ctrl + Shift + T on the keyboard. Then, once the terminal window is open, follow the instructions below.
Single-user
To install the Inverse icon theme in single-user mode, start by moving the terminal session into the “Downloads” directory with the CD command.
cd ~/Downloads.
Once inside of the “Downloads” directory, make use of the mkdir command to create the “.icons” folder in your home directory
mkdir -p ~/.icons
Finally, install the Inverse icon theme in single-user mode with the mv command.
mv Inverse*/ ~/.icons/
System-wide
To install the Inverse icon theme on Linux in system-wide mode, start by moving the terminal session into the “Downloads” directory with the CD command.
cd ~/Downloads
Now that the terminal is in the “Downloads” directory elevate the terminal session to the root user using sudo -s.
sudo -s
Finally, install the Inverse icon theme in system-wide mode using the following mv command.
mv Inverse*/ /usr/share/icons/
Activating Inverse on Linux
The Inverse icon theme is now installed on your Linux PC, but you cannot use it yet. To use Inverse, you must first access your system settings area and change the default icon theme to “Inverse.” Here’s how to do it.
First, open up “System Settings” on your Linux PC. Then, search for “Appearance” settings or “Icons.” Once in “Appearance” or “Icons,” change the default icons to “Inverse” to start using the Inverse Icon theme on Linux.
Are you having trouble figuring out how to enable Inverse on your Linux PC? Take a look at the list below and click on the link that matches the Linux desktop you use to learn how to change icon themes.
