Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
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Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
1–10 of 31 posts
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#2The definition of grey is totally debatable, but in W3C spec Green = #008000 (instead of #00FF00, which is called Lime?) makes no sense.
How did it happen?
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#3I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why?
Does all this has any real world implications?
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#4The definition of grey is totally debatable, but in W3C spec Green = #008000 (instead of #00FF00, which is called Lime?) makes no sense. How did it happen?
My guess? Most green things you see are a darker green. The extremely bright green (lime according to the W3C) is less useful, so they probably chose the color based on what they thought the user would expect.
Given that RGB is well-known, I suspect their assumption was wrong, but I have nothing to back that up.
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#5I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why? Does all this has any real world implications?
I used to use them in both X11 and CSS way back in the day. They were really common in X11, because a lot of users were on pseudocolor displays and it made sense to reuse colors as much as possible.
If you used uncommon colors in your program on - for example - a Sparcstation 20, the palette would shift every time you moved the mouse in or out of your window. It's difficult to describe to someone that's never seen it, but it's unpleasant. No one mourns the death of pseudocolor.
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#6The definition of grey is totally debatable, but in W3C spec Green = #008000 (instead of #00FF00, which is called Lime?) makes no sense. How did it happen?
My guess? Most green things you see are a darker green. The extremely bright green (lime according to the W3C) is less useful, so they probably chose the color based on what they thought the user would expect. Given that RGB is well-known, I suspect their assumption was wrong, but I have nothing to back that up.
Also, green is the brightest primary after accounting for typical human vision and typical monitors. The YUV formulas put at nearly twice as bright as red.
So a normal display has more green than you'd need, and 00ff00 green has terrible contrast against ffffff white
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#7I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why? Does all this has any real world implications?
On the CSS side, I sometimes use named colors as an anchor point. Like when writing a dark mode and thinking "that text might look good in yellowish" I set "amber", and the result was good enough to keep it. Other times it makes for a good challenge, limit your design options to only named colors to not get lost in the color wheel.
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#8I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why? Does all this has any real world implications?
As touched on in the article, the beauty of colour names would be that they’re celebrated for the machine.
#124356 might look different on one monitor or workstation compared to another.
Having colour names which are calibrated for the device makes a lot of sense. Assuming those colour names are actually calibrated, which as the article also mentions, so often wasn’t the case.
As an aside, this is a big problem in DTP where your display should match the page. However you obviously wouldn’t use colour names in that specific industry because you’re dealing with a vastly greater range of colours and shades.
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#9I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why? Does all this has any real world implications?
As touched on in the article, the beauty of colour names would be that they’re celebrated for the machine. #124356 might look different on one monitor or workstation compared to another. Having colour names which are calibrated for the device makes a lot of sense. Assuming those colour names are actually calibrated, which as the article also mentions, so often wasn’t the case. As an aside, this is a big problem in DT…
Nitpick: you absolutely would use colour names in that industry - it's just that the colour names would be more along the lines of "Pantone 137C" than "Yellow".
Re: Clashes between web and X11 colors in the CSS color scheme
#10I never use color names (except if I quick want to set a color in CSS for testing purposes) so I wonder who is using color names and why? Does all this has any real world implications?
As touched on in the article, the beauty of colour names would be that they’re celebrated for the machine. #124356 might look different on one monitor or workstation compared to another. Having colour names which are calibrated for the device makes a lot of sense. Assuming those colour names are actually calibrated, which as the article also mentions, so often wasn’t the case. As an aside, this is a big problem in DT…
In desktop publishing or other graphic arts where you are sending your files to pre-press for physical printing you would use CMYK or Pantone (for spot colours) + paper grade.