Lazarus Release 4.0

[440bx]

You wouldn't write on a black piece of paper right?

I definitely wouldn't write on a black piece of paper but, when it comes to coding the only background I consider acceptable is total black.  The reason is simple, black means no light is being sent into your eyes, which means, no artificial light stressing your retina.  At the same time, the black background (because it is "no light") provides much better contrast with other colors.

All that said, it's still a matter of personal taste but, regardless of personal taste, a completely black background is better for your eyes.

[Thaddy]

Think blackboard, we all grew up with that. Chalk dust. The ultimate dark theme.
(although personally I have a great dislike of dark themes )

[munair]

All that said, it's still a matter of personal taste but, regardless of personal taste, a completely black background is better for your eyes.

Then, when getting out, after some hours coding behind your dark monitor, you probably would need sun glasses to protect your eyes from simply daylight. ;-) Anyway, there are plenty of colors that equally stand out on a white background and I've grown so much accustomed to the traditional Delphi-like theme that I cannot think of using something else, especially after setting up a new Lazarus installation.

It is indeed a matter of taste, but I do see advantages to a light background, which are not limited to coding issues alone. The one area where I do use darker backgrounds/interfaces is photo/video editing (many editors don't offer a choice anyway). But I'm always happy to get back to light when finished or taking a break. :-).

[munair]

Think blackboard, we all grew up with that. Chalk dust. The ultimate dark theme.
(although personally I have a great dislike of dark themes )

Yeah, blackboards, which in our country were usually quite greenish. And after the teacher finished his explanation, one would turn to his/her white piece of paper or white paged book.

[440bx]

I couldn't look at that white background stuff you posted for more than 5 minutes.

I can somewhat tolerate light backgrounds in some apps, like a browser but not in an app I look at for hours at a time (such as a text editor.)  That's another thing that makes Visual Studio unbearable, it's slow and the colors are never right.

with a black background, strings, numerals, comments, punctuation, everything important jumps at you

[Martin_fr]

, black means no light is being sent into your eyes,

Which also means: your pupils having to open wider (as they do if it is darker). Which in turn means the focal field (not sure if that is the correct English term) becomes more narrow, and your eyes have to put in more work to keep the exact focus.

As in a camera a narrow small aperture, so does a "small pupils" in the eye increase the area (min to max distance) within which something is focused. With a bigger aperture things have to be exactly on the right distance, and all else starts bluing... => more light, wider pupils, less focal adjustment by the muscles controlling the lens in your eye.

A white background should not be tiring, if
- its overall brightness is moderate (many monitors come with defaults that act as floodlight..., but that can be adjusted).
- the room surrounding you is equally well lit (so your pupils are as small as possible / helping the focusing)
- the lighting is set up to avoid glaring and reflection

Of course, if you switch, your brain needs to adjust to interpret the reverse image. That is tiring for some time too, though not to the eyes.

[threedslider]

Hi and thank you for the wonderful Lazarus v. 4.0 

I will switch to the version 4.0 in the hope that I will work with this !

Thanks for sharing and keep it up !

[simone]

About MetaDarkStyle, it doesn't work for me with Lazarus 4.0 on Windows. Has anyone tried it? Thanks.

[Hansvb]

In options you can choose force dark style.

https://forum.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,71050.msg554095.html#msg554095

[simone]

Yes I know. I did this.

In options you can choose force dark style.

https://forum.lazarus.freepascal.org/index.php/topic,71050.msg554095.html#msg554095

[flowCRANE]

I still use white backgrounds and simply cannot and won't get used to trending dark background app development.

We do not install dark themes because of trends, but because of necessity — we simply prefer to look at less intense and bright screen content, saving our eyesight and extending working time. In the past, all (non-console) IDEs were white because the operating system forced them to be so, but those medieval conditions are long gone — we have the tools, we have the capabilities, and we want to use them to make our work easier.

About MetaDarkStyle, it doesn't work for me with Lazarus 4.0 on Windows. Has anyone tried it? Thanks.

I use it on Windows 10, in Lazarus 4.0 — it works as intended, just like in previous versions of the IDE (see attachment).

[Martin_fr]

We do not install dark themes because of trends, but because of necessity — we simply prefer to look at less intense and bright screen content, saving our eyesight and extending working time.

Interesting... I use a light theme, exactly because it is better for the health of the eyes.

[Rico54]

Thanks for the great work! As old Pascal programmer now, at the age of 70, I've started to programming again thanks to the Lazarus Project and I've wrote a small app for a nonprofit association (a small library in my village).
I'm happy, I feel like a live person and not an old slipper 

[Khrys]

Which also means: your pupils having to open wider (as they do if it is darker). Which in turn means the focal field (not sure if that is the correct English term) becomes more narrow, and your eyes have to put in more work to keep the exact focus.

[...]

A white background should not be tiring, if
- its overall brightness is moderate (many monitors come with defaults that act as floodlight..., but that can be adjusted).
- the room surrounding you is equally well lit (so your pupils are as small as possible / helping the focusing)
- the lighting is set up to avoid glaring and reflection

I'd rather rely on the room lighting to keep my pupils small. I don't like staring directly at bright light sources such as lamps, the sun, or white editor backgrounds 

[VisualLab]

Problems with white backgrounds and dark letters in the editor will be forgotten when you can easily buy monitors with e-paper displays in stores. The current ones (for now) have too long a content change time. But in a few years this will change. Their additional advantage will be very low energy consumption (power consumption only when changing pixels and by electronic circuits receiving data).