Ask HN: Do you program in black or white? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#21

Post by nailer » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 12:50 AM UTC

pavelludiq wrote: post #2

I cant stand light backgrounds, i prefer dark ones(but not black). This is the vim colorscheme im using: http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=1778 I like it a lot!

There's a great VibrantInk port for vim around too.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#22

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 12:52 AM UTC

zacharydanger wrote: post #13

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawthorne_effect

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#23

Post by gjm11 » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 1:13 AM UTC

Black background, light-coloured text, not too much Angry Fruit Salad, very small fonts to fit as much as possible on the screen.

Easier on the eyes, plus it happens to be what I'm used to.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#24

Post by alain94040 » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 1:30 AM UTC

On Eclipse and Xcode it's black text (or colored for keywords) on white background. I haven't programmed on a black background since the early 90s on the Apple II.

I remember making the switch, at first I was shocked. By now, I'm completely used to it.

http://fairsoftware.net : where geeks are their own boss

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#25

Post by mrtron » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 1:42 AM UTC

Terminal I go dark - Textmate I go light.

Maybe I should switch to dark - it is a bit nicer on the eyes I think.

Edit: Switched over Textmate to a dark theme, and I am glad for the reminder. I don't know why on this new machine I didn't have it set that way!

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#26

Post by Freaky » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 2:22 AM UTC

Dark on light, always. Specifically, I use #0d2a3a as my background; a nice dark blue I find a bit more pleasing than just black.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#27

Post by briansmith » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 2:26 AM UTC

I program in shades of gray.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#28

Post by wenbert » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 2:40 AM UTC

I use the ZenBurn colors. http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000682.html

Very easy to read. And not boring.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#29

Post by dejb » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 3:04 AM UTC

zacharydanger wrote: post #13

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawthorne_effect

Interesting point. So perhaps the implicit suggestions is to randomise your backgrounds and colour schemes to improve productivity. Maybe if you told others that it was part of an experiment and the results were 'being monitored' it might work for a while. Otherwise I don't think so.

Re: Ask HN: Do you program in black or white?

#30

Post by colonhyphenp » Mon, Jan 19, 2009, 3:05 AM UTC

I started using the Railscast TextMate theme a few months ago and have been quite satisfied - it's got a dark grey-ish brown background. http://railscasts.com/about