ColourAssumptions
Introduction
Since I have been using dark GTK and QT themes for a while, I have noticed that some programs assume the user is using a dark-on-light colour-scheme. This ends up with parts of applications being made useless or at least severely hampered, because text is made invisible. Of course theming everything would be nice, but forcing colours makes sense in many applications. The problem comes when a mixture of forced and themed colours is used, the classic example being Epiphany's handling of SSL web addresses versus Firefox's. In Epiphany the address bar's background is forced to pale yellow, but the text keeps it's themed colour, allowing pale yellow fonts on a pale yellow background. In Firefox the pale yellow background is forced, but the text is also forced to be black. This situation works well since any font colour can be used in the GTK theme without making SSL web addresses illegible. The same situation might apply in reverse, ie. forcing dark fonts but leaving the background up to the theme.
Use this page to document any applications which are guilty of this, so hopefully they can be remedied (it is usually application-specific widgets, since they are not affected by the theme and are not open to as much use and critisism as the core libraries like GTK).
NOTE: If websites' fonts are rendered in this way in your browser then this is the fault of the site's web master, not the browser (for example, Yahoo! Mail's new interface is terrible with white fonts). Many websites can be forced to use system colours with options like turning off Epiphany's "Let web pages specify their own colours".
The Accused
Please add to the list if you know of any more:
Application |
Bad Element |
Problem |
Fix (if available) |
Bug |
Eclipse |
Bottom bar, next to garbage collector |
Forces a pale yellow background but uses theme's font, making pale/white fonts unreadable |
I do not know what this box does, since it is just a pale bar for me. I think it might contain numbers. I have no idea how to fix it |
|
Epiphany |
Location bar |
Bar becomes light-yellow when SSL pages are accessed, but leaves the font as themed, making white fonts unreadable |
Nothing permanent. The text must be selected to become differentiated from the background |
|
Gedit |
Text highlighted by the find tool |
Searching for a word/set of characters gives the matches a pale yellow background, but leaves the text as themed, making pale/white fonts unreadable |
Nothing that I know of, however the illegible text always matches the search-term, making this more of an annoyance |
|
Gmail Notify |
Popup window |
Popup window has white background but system themed text, allowing white-on-white |
Patch to fix background. Thanks klamech |
|
Listen |
Integrated web browser |
Background is forced to be white, but the theme's fonts are used, making web pages appear blank when white fonts are used |
The file /usr/lib/listen/web_manager.py has on line 54 "background-color:white;" which can be changed as super user |
|
Nvu |
Tip window |
Opens at startup a window for tips, however this uses theme-on-white, so if the theme font colour is light (like white) then it becomes unreadable |
None that I know of, and I have heard that Nvu is no longer maintained |
|
Rhythmbox |
Playlist search bar |
After narrowing down the playlist with a search the search bar becomes pale yellow, leaving the fonts as-is (even if they become unreadable) |
|
Comments
ColourAssumptions (last edited 2009-07-05 23:06:32 by S0106001310e97881)