GNOME Themes Standard (gnome-themes-standard) is a completely free and open source software package that provides a collection of themes specifically designed for the GNOME desktop environment.

Just like gnome-backgrounds, this package is also distributed as part of the GNOME Project. The difference is that it cannot be used as a standalone application on other open source desktop environments or window managers.

Only two themes are included in the GNOME Themes Standard package, HighContrast and Adwaita, which is the default one, activated along with the GNOME graphical desktop environment.

To change between the two themes, right-click anywhere on the desktop and access the ‘Change Desktop Background’ option. Alternatively, you can open the GNOME Control Center application and access the Background section.

If you’re installing from the source package, the gnome-themes-standard must be configured and compiled like any other open-source software. Download and save the latest stable version from Softpedia on your computer, unpack the archive with an archive manager utility, open a terminal emulator app and navigate to the location of the extracted archive files using the ‘cd’ command (e.g. cd /home/softpedia/gnome-themes-standard-3.14.2).

Arrived at the location of the extracted archive files, run the ‘./configure’ command to configure/optimize the package of a specific hardware architecture or operating system, then run the ‘make’ command to compile it, followed by either of the ‘make install’ or ‘sudo make install’ commands (depending it you’re root or a privileged user) to install it system wide.