RE: RE: Ideas for PerlMonks Themes

I have to disagree strongly with piptigger -- this dark theme makes my eyes water and burn, especially because of the complete lack of contrast in the nested comments. I don't know of any research on usability that says black on white is less readable than white on black, but I KNOW that grey/yellow on white is virtually impossible to read. (I only read arstechnica when absolutely necessary.)

Adjust your brightness/contrast so the monitor doesn't hurt your eyes. Get a glare filter. Buy a flat panel. The problem is not the site design, it's the fact that computer monitors are just not good for your eyes.

I hate to even comment on this at all, because as vroom says, he's got more pressing things to do than worry about prettifying the site.

(I do like the idea of a medieval theme. I have many artist friends. Maybe one of 'em would volunteer.)

e-mail neshura

Comment on RE: RE: Ideas for PerlMonks Themes

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RE: RE: RE: Ideas for PerlMonks Themes by Anonymous Monk on Mar 20, 2000 at 06:16 UTC
I hate light-on-dark text viewing. Humans like myself are diurnal creatures, used to viewing things in the light. Command line interfaces use light-on-dark because back when the first command lines were developed, white was expensive. Remember when computer monitors were all black with green or orange text? It's (obviously) not as easy to read black on flourescent green as it is to read green on black, but at the same time it's easier to read black on white than just about anything on black. White gives the impression of clean emptyness.	[reply]
RE: RE: RE: RE: Ideas for PerlMonks Themes by PipTigger (Hermit) on Mar 20, 2000 at 16:48 UTC
Obviously light gray or bright yellow on white is not what I was advocating but either of those text colors on a very dark one look mighty fine AFAIC. Now, I've looked up diurnal like a good nerd should (and saw that it was blatantly apparent from context after the fact)... and I guess this isn't as much of a no-brainer as it seems. Obviously people are different and maybe average human beings are predominantly aroused during the daytime however... (I'm sorry if this all sounds too stereotypical but it is such because it is true in many cases) a large percentage of coders and a larger percentage of hackers (ie. $japh x 65535) find their productivity and concentration increase when undisturbed within the stillness of night. I used to work for a lame web hosting company and it was impossible to code anything really useful during the day... intercom page-alls every couple of minutes about sports scores or somebody on line 7... then you've got people who need you to help them with their computer because it needs a file cleanup on drive c: every couple of seconds or their mouse isn't working properly (needs to be cleaned) and they're afraid of breaking it or touching the wrong keys and watching the puter blow up. It wasn't the ideal situation and it was pretty sad that I was their only coder and also the most informed employee regarding hardware configuration/repair issues (not that I know very much about anything other than cutting edge gaming hardware) ... long story short ...	[reply]
RE: RE: RE: Ideas for PerlMonks Themes by PipTigger (Hermit) on Mar 21, 2000 at 17:02 UTC
days are loud, disturbed, and busy in a typical office... nights can be focused, intense, and far more productive when it comes to writing code. (<tangent> I love staring at code so long while malnourished and sleep deprived that I sense vertigo before my monitor =) </tan>) Also, working nights means that one can likely be immersed in electronica or classical or whatever you prefer without sweaty headphones on and there are no neighbors or family members to awake (since most offices are in commercial districts nicely removed from the residential burbclaves) ... so maybe I'm an immature lamer script kiddie whose security blanket is my resemblance of every typical hacker (although not quite as perv as Mouse in Matrix) ... maybe I'm not all or any of those things but I do think this issue is intimately fundamental to every interaction with a computing device. How will we tell it what we want it to do? How will we know that it did it? My main point is that screens don't have to destroy or offend onlooker's eyes... maybe it's like hard plastic seats at McDon's or BurgerChum where they don't want you to get too comfortable so you won't want to lounge about and clutter the dining room so others can buy and dine ... I don't know about you but when the whole thing is actually glaring, radiating, electron beams a beaming and cathode rays arraying) I'd rather focus on a little bright text than gape at fluorescence while trying to dial pupils into a little dark text. Thanks for reading my long winded %re of why I think what I think (and for enduring my poor paragraphing ability). I welcome any further discussion regarding this issue since I feel so passionately about it. I'll try to be open minded but I don't like it when dust gets in there (maybe I need a Microsoft optical intellibrain with lasereye technology). TTFN & Shalom. -PipTigger	[reply]