Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

A place for users to ask each other questions, make suggestions, and discuss Bookends.
Asutu
Posts: 25
Joined: Sat Apr 16, 2016 11:05 am

Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Asutu »

Hi,

after updating Bookends to the new version 13.4 in a Macbook Pro running 10.14.6 (18G4032), in dark mode some fields in the Edit panel do not show properly. This seems to be affecting Authors, Title, Journal, Date and Key, which show as white and the characters inside are invisible. Please see image attached. These fields are not empty, rather they're not showing the text. All other fields and notes seem to be rendered properly.

Many thanks for starting supporting dark mode.
Pedro
Attachments
Screenshot 2020-04-03 at 14.57.44.png
Screenshot 2020-04-03 at 14.57.44.png (179.49 KiB) Viewed 6260 times
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

Do you have BibTeX enabled in preferences, and are telling Bookends to color the required fields?

Jon
Sonny Software
Asutu
Posts: 25
Joined: Sat Apr 16, 2016 11:05 am

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Asutu »

You're correct, setting "Indicate required fields by" to Nothing (it was to color, and the default color was white) in the BibTex preferences panel solved this.

Many thanks for the quick reply and suggestion.
Pedro
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

There are 3 ways I can deal with this:

1. Like now, let the user handle the color

2. Fix the colors for light mode (yellow) and dark mode (something dark).

3. Simply ignore the color setting in dark mode and use a black background.

Do people who use this feature have a preference?

Jon
Sonny Software
iandol
Posts: 465
Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2008 2:31 pm

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by iandol »

I always use dark mode when available and like having this coloured to my preference, and I would prefer the first option (let users deal with it). But I wonder if you aren't going to get lots of support questions over this. The most elegant fix would be to have this set separately for dark and light modes, and on first use of dark mode set it to something legible. Some people do switch automatically mode depending on day/night, and this would affect them unless there were two settings (or you ignore it in dark mode, but it seems strange to have an option which only works in one mode)...

p.s. thanks for update, looks great!
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

Having two settings is an option, but I'm not sure adding more preference settings (doesn't Bookends have enough?) is the best option. Another possibility is to take the option for light mode and simply make it darker (keeping the shade, just darker).

Jon
Sonny Software
iandol
Posts: 465
Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2008 2:31 pm

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by iandol »

Yeah, I agree preferences are crowded enough already... What about keeping one setting widget in the UI, but depending on what mode you are in, save the preference differently. So in light mode you have the same UI as dark mode, but a different colour is shown. The downside is you can only configure for the mode you are currently in...

An auto-tweak colour may work, though for those of us who stick to dark mode it would be a bit annoying, as we'd set a colour but it wouldn't be what was selected so we'd have to guess what the result would be if I understand correctly?
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

Yes, you do.

Having two color viewing modes makes lettings users assign colors much more problematic. Fixing the color for both views would solve a lot of problems.

Jon
Sonny Software
DrJJWMac
Posts: 345
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2019 8:04 am
Location: Alabama USA

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by DrJJWMac »

Chiming in as one who has not (yet) used these features.

Can the colors of the TITLES to the fields be toggled to indicate the BibTeX required fields instead of toggling the fields themselves?

Would this be a more appropriate approach to keep the fields consistent in light or dark mode?

Would this be less useful as an effective indication of what is/is not required for the BibTeX citation?
--
JJW
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

It doesn't change anything -- it's the colors used (for the fields or the titles). The colors have to be different for the different modes. We're talking about how those colors are decided on.

Jon
Sonny Software
DrJJWMac
Posts: 345
Joined: Sat Jun 22, 2019 8:04 am
Location: Alabama USA

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by DrJJWMac »

The difference I am trying to convey is in the appearance of which portions of the view are "off-color" as designations of required fields. I would find an approach that has the FIELDS honor the settings for light/dark mode and instead sets the TITLES to a distinct color when the field has a special meaning to be visually less "glaring".

In such a case, I would certainly vote for Option 2.

--
JJW
--
JJW
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

I know, but that's not a solution if the labels (which is what we call them since we don't want to confuse them with the Title field) look wrong, it's just slightly "less wrong" if you will than having the wrong field color.

If you're going to have use use pre-defined colors then it doesn't matter what is colored -- it will look good in both modes. And that's fine with me. Much simpler.

landol wants to be able to set his own colors for both light and dark mode. More difficult to implement without adding another preference setting.

Jon
Sonny Software
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

I've made two color options in the BibTeX tab in preferences: light mode and dark mode. That way there will be default settings I chose but that the user can modify.

Jon
Sonny Software
Jon
Site Admin
Posts: 10048
Joined: Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:27 pm
Location: Bethesda, MD
Contact:

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by Jon »

This was implemented in a silent update, so if you're using this feature (colored BibTeX fields) in Dark Mode you can try it out.

Jon
Sonny Software
iandol
Posts: 465
Joined: Fri Jan 25, 2008 2:31 pm

Re: Dark mode makes Authors, Title, Journal and Date text invisible

Post by iandol »

OK, works well thanks. One small detail, when you select a new colour, the UI itself does not update automatically, you have to reselect the "Indicate required fields by:" drop-down (i.e. if you have it set to "Color" you have to select "Color" again), then you can see the effect "live" in the UI.
Post Reply