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Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

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Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#51

Post by tarboreus »

mrob wrote: post #39
DubiousPusher wrote: post #5

Speaking from my own disability I'd say I'd much prefer if people used white on dark text over any use of light background. But this is because my own issue is with photosensitivity which affects a large number of low vision users. In fact I often create white on black content because it is easy for me to author and read. I also have significant color blindness and am totally unsure which color combinations are hard…

If both options cause problems, you should pick the one with the best workaround. Sunglasses can reduce brightness, but increasing brightness is much more difficult, so dark text on light background is correct.

No, sunglasses aren't going to fix contrast sensitivity due to photophobia. As a low vision person putting on sunglasses inside just means I can't see anything.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#52

Post by DubiousPusher »

jankotek wrote: post #9
DubiousPusher wrote: post #5

Speaking from my own disability I'd say I'd much prefer if people used white on dark text over any use of light background. But this is because my own issue is with photosensitivity which affects a large number of low vision users. In fact I often create white on black content because it is easy for me to author and read. I also have significant color blindness and am totally unsure which color combinations are hard…

Maybe you find this browser extension useful: https://darkreader.org/

Thanks. On desktop I use Windows High Contrast Black which is excellent. Firefox does a pretty good job of modifying web content to follow that theme. The main issue I haven't solved is mobile browsing. Most mobile browsers don't allow extensions and the OSes don't have anything like Windows High Contrast Mode except invent but that's never been a great solution for me.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#53

Post by bitwize »

ars wrote: post #41
bitwize wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy, are you going to love this state-of-the-art new display technology: https://c1.staticflickr.com/5/4142/4765726924_0c81d46a5b_b.j... (Seriously, though, there may be an underlying physiological reason why the glow of a green phosphor CRT was so pleasing...)

I always set my IDE to emulate those green CRT's when I can. But there is an underlying physiological reason, see: https://gamesx.com/misctech/visual.htm (the website is very old and has aged badly, but makes the point). Your eye has no ability to see blue in high resolution.

For me it's Emacs in a terminal, set to a nice chunky bitmap (or bitmap-alike) font and #7fff7f foreground on black background. :) (For amber, try the X11 color "goldenrod", or #daa520!)

I'm aware of cool-retro-term. It is cool, but not useful for more than five minutes or so at a time.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#54

Post by limomium »

RenRav wrote: post #4

This describes my own personal experience with dark themes, difficult to read.

My experience is the opposite. Having switched entirely to light on dark (as well as adjusting the blue component of my screens to zero), switching the display of information back to dark on light feels like a nuclear blast of a million Suns into my eyes.

How can anyone stand staring directly into a bright lamp all day long? Well, having gotten used to it, you don't notice how unhealthy it truly is.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#55

Post by jankotek »

DubiousPusher wrote: post #52
jankotek wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe you find this browser extension useful: https://darkreader.org/

Thanks. On desktop I use Windows High Contrast Black which is excellent. Firefox does a pretty good job of modifying web content to follow that theme. The main issue I haven't solved is mobile browsing. Most mobile browsers don't allow extensions and the OSes don't have anything like Windows High Contrast Mode except invent but that's never been a great solution for me.

This extension works on mobile firefox

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#56

Post by bootlooped »

michaelmrose wrote: post #30
bootlooped wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For me, I find that a very dark gray background with a light gray text color is best. I like dark themes, but I get "ghosting" if the contrast is too great.

This is hard for virtually everyone to read. I don't think making the reading experience terrible for 99.999% to make it work for 0.001% makes much sense.

I think what I described is what a lot of dark themes use. For example the NY Times Android app. Their light text color is not pure white, and the background is not pure black.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#57

Post by dnh44 »

tarboreus wrote: post #51
mrob wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If both options cause problems, you should pick the one with the best workaround. Sunglasses can reduce brightness, but increasing brightness is much more difficult, so dark text on light background is correct.

No, sunglasses aren't going to fix contrast sensitivity due to photophobia. As a low vision person putting on sunglasses inside just means I can't see anything.

It’s possible to get polarised lenses that have about 50% transmission which is quite comfortable for computer work. At least for me they are anyway.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#58

Post by RenRav »

limomium wrote: post #54
RenRav wrote: post #4

This describes my own personal experience with dark themes, difficult to read.

My experience is the opposite. Having switched entirely to light on dark (as well as adjusting the blue component of my screens to zero), switching the display of information back to dark on light feels like a nuclear blast of a million Suns into my eyes. How can anyone stand staring directly into a bright lamp all day long? Well, having gotten used to it, you don't notice how unhealthy it truly is.

Working in a properly lit environment, with a blue filter enabled, it sometimes feels like the papers on my desk are about the same brightness as my monitor.

At home during the night I have to turn the blue filter up until the monitor is practically glowing orange-red.

Re: Never Use White Text on Black: Astygmatism and Conference Slides (2017)

#60

Post by aitchnyu »

localhost wrote: post #18

Perhaps building an app that synchronizes conference slides to a phone and allows users to customize the contrast/appearance of the slides would help in this case?

I wanted to experiment with VLC broadcasting over wifi for my workshops. It could reduce dependance on projectors, I encounter 1024x768 ones, as an Indian.
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