Modifying Window Button Colors in Mac OS X

Question

How can I modify the red/yellow/green window buttons for close/minimize/zoom in Mac OS X? There must be an editable resource or plist somewhere.

Here are the buttons I\

Answer 1

Modifying buttons in MacOSX 10.11 El Capitan can also be done by an Alex Zielenski's tool called "ThemeEngine", found HERE at github.com. You have to edit copies of the

“.car” files in: /System/Library/CoreServices/SystemAppearance.bundle/Contents/Resources

Each of these .car files contains "WindowFrame_WindowControlButtons" which itself consists of 240 items (!). I "grouped" those (= button in app window) with first "Size" then "Scale". Higher resolved "...@x2.psd" items are used for Retina Displays, "small" ones for in-app windows, like the colors palette in TextEdit.

In ThemeEngine graphic items (*.psd!) are selected and sent/received to/from a compatible Editor (eg: Photoshop), but can also be individually dragged to any folder, changed or replaced by other apps (even "Preview") and be re-dragged to any .car-file window in ThemeEngine.

Normally you'd first have to deactivate SIP in El Capitan, but I found it easier to select my "old" Maverick USB drive as startup disk and drag the SystemAppearance.car back into SystemAppearance.bundle manually, then to re-restart (see also "AccessibilityDarkAppearance.car").

I find the new disgustingly-2D icons really amateurish, kind of "deflated" -- so I exchanged them with a set of Maverick-like ones, copied from an older MacOSX. As a compromise I applied the "negative" white plus/minus signs used in El-Capitan.

(Btw: I didn't use the above mentioned artFileTool by Alex to get at the Aqua buttons, but simply made a series of screenshots and cut out the various states of round Aqua buttons.)

If anybody is interested I can post my "SystemAppearance.car" file here ...