John,
Sample of my "Charcoal-Black" theme.
https://imgur.com/a/Sb1ZY
Now, I must admit my eyesight is not the best, and I wear tri-focal glasses. Which is why I prefer a dark theme. I often use hairline/vertical bar in LPEX, to help me find my cursor. I also turn on "Accessibility" in RDI/Eclipse due to my poor eyesight.
Here is what I call "Charcoal Black" color, to match the rest of the Eclipse Neon Dark theme:
https://imgur.com/a/hsuRr
So, as I promised, below are my "longhand" instructions. Maybe not 100%, but at least it is a "start". :)
---------------------------------------------
RDi 9.6.01 Basic "Charcoal Black" Theme instructions
1.) Set the General Eclipse to a "DARK" theme
Window>Preference>General>Appearance
--> Theme: "Dark"
--> Color and Font theme: "Classic Theme"
Restart RDI 9.6.0.1
2.) Set LPEX to Palette DARK, I picked "Charcoal Black", as I call it...
Window>Preference>LPEX Editor>Appearance --> Palette: "Black"
--> "Styles"
background background: "Charcoal-Black" foreground: "WHITE"
CurrentLine background: "Charcoal-Black" foreground: "BLACK"
default background: "Charcoal-Black"
emphasis background: "Purple"
expandHide background: "Charcoal-Black"
formatLine background: "Charcoal-Black"
messageLine background: "Charcoal-Black"
parserDefault background: "Charcoal-Black"
parserMessage background: "Charcoal-Black"
prefixArea background: "Charcoal-Black"
prefixArea background: "Charcoal-Black"
3.) set a few SQLRPGLE colors
Window>Preference>LPEX Editor>Parsers> Parsers Styles:
--> Document parser: "ILErpgSql" NOTE: You might need to update others, ILEPRG, ILECLLE, etc...
comment: foreground: "Light Green"
Exclude Source Section: background: "Charcoal-Black"
Free-Form Control-Flow Opcode: foreground: "Pink"
data: foreground: "RED" Background: "Light Green"
Free-Form Quoted Literal: foreground: "RED" Background: "Light Green"
SQL Character String Constant: foreground: "RED" Background: "Light Green"
4.) Nesting out line color
Window>Preference>Remote Systems>Remote Systems LPEX Editor>IBM i Parsers
--> "Show Block Nesting": "Pink"
5.) Change a few Annotations
Window>Preference>General>Editors>Text Editors>Annotations
--> Compiled Language Debug Call Stack: "Black"
--> Compiled Language Debug Current instruction Pointer: "Black"
--> Debug Current Instruction Pointer: "Dashed Box" Color: "Red"
--> Occurrences(org.eclipse.imp.runtime.occurrenceAnnoation): "Brown"
6.) Change the Text Editor
Window>Preference>General>Editors>Structure Text Editors
--> Complete proposal background: "black"
--> Complete proposal foreground: "White"
--> Parameter hints background: "Black"
--> Parameter hints foreground: "White"
PS. I hope this helps other IBM i Developers, whom like a dark theme. It is easier on my old eyes. :)
After you have customized to you own preference. I recommend that you export it for safekeeping.
File>export
You could put that export on a network drive to share with your fellow IBM i Developers. They could import them into their own RDI 9.6.0.1 client! Cool!
I have discovered that EVERYONE seems to have his or her own color preferences. We are all different. :)
-Ken Killian-
-----Original Message-----
From: WDSCI-L <wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Ken Killian
Sent: Friday, March 9, 2018 7:12 AM
To: Rational Developer for IBM i / Websphere Development Studio Client for System i & iSeries <wdsci-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [WDSCI-L] Dark theme (was: RSE perspective won't reset)
John,
Yes, the find dialog is one I have not found out how to adjust that yet. <sad face> I am willing to be it is NOT using the settings inside of eclipse.
I only had to adjust the black background on the Palette. Then on the ILERPGSql parser, I only had to adjust the Primary color. The Back-ground color were changed when I updated the palette. So, for me, a user of RDI for over 12-years, it was not hard for me. Being experienced, it only took me about 5-minutes.
I first tried the dark theme on the Old RDI using Luna, and the dark theme was terrible. The little triangle on the remote explorer were too dark. Eclipse Neon greatly approve the dark theme, which I am very glad to get a "decent" dark theme with some customization.
Here is a snapshot on dark theme in eclipse, as a example:
https://www.eclipse.org/community/eclipse_newsletter/2017/february/images/darkest-dark.png
I had to change the indent color here:
(Short cut key: Ctrl+shift+O=Show indentation)
windows>preference>Remote Systems>Remote system LPEX Editor>IBM I
windows>preference>Parser
I change the "Show Block Nesting" to a light color, since my back-ground is now black.
I also had to change my color for the break point line here:
windows>preferences>General>Editors>text Editors
"Debug Current Instruction Pointer", I happen to use Dashed Box color Red...
Great thing about eclipse is it highly customizable. The bad thing is finding all the settings in eclipse.
Most of my co-workers who use a dark-theme, only use it for LPEX only... They keep the BRIGHT-WHITE for the other screens.
So, it does take a lot of customization. Which takes time and a lot of trial and error.
PS. This weekend, I will create a Text file for my Dark theme to share. You are right, it will be good to document it for others, and also for myself. Maybe I can put it on Wiki, here:
http://wiki.midrange.com
Your updates make it better! --> Thanks Buck! :)
I know wiki is updatable, but I haven't ever done that before. Hopefully, I can figure that out. Nothing else, I could cut & paste my instructions in text format for a "start"... Not "perfect", but a "start"... Then I will post my start this weekend, and go from there...
Great Suggestion John! Appreciate it!
PS. I notice on eclipse neon, they have change their Find/change dialog complete different! So on a dark theme it is the same as the LPEX find and replace.
-Ken Killian-
-----Original Message-----
From: WDSCI-L <wdsci-l-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of John Yeung
Sent: Thursday, March 8, 2018 6:30 PM
To: Rational Developer for IBM i / Websphere Development Studio Client for System i & iSeries <wdsci-l@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [WDSCI-L] Dark theme (was: RSE perspective won't reset)
On Thu, Mar 8, 2018 at 1:53 PM, Ken Killian <kkillian@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
There are many little updates you have to do for nice "Dark-Theme".
For a start only, Here is how you get the LPEX edit to be DARK:
1.) >Window>Preferences>LPEX Editor>Appearance
* Choose Palette "Black"
* change the background color to black for each one.
Except for the cursor! <Hint Hint>
https://imgur.com/a/RlIcQ
How long ago did you have to adjust the background color for each element? I just trial-installed 9.6.0.1 and you'll be glad to know that the black palette LPEX defaults were quite reasonable as-is.
I had to do some other changes too...
I had to change General Appearance & annotations & some other colors.
Have you been able to fix the find-replace dialog which overlays the bottom of LPEX? The options are practically invisible in Dark theme.
Or do you never change those options so it doesn't matter? Or do you use some other search facility? (iSphere maybe?)
I wish I could export & share. It is not perfect, I am still adjusting...
Well, there may not be uploadable themes (yet), but you can still share your settings in "longhand" form by writing them out in words in a blog post or GitHub repo or wiki or something. And then you can update it as you continue to tweak your environment.
Yeah, it would be a little tedious for you to write it out, and for other users to manually adjust their settings according to your instructions, but it would still be better to have them all in one place than for everyone (including possibly yourself!) to have to keep rediscovering them all, over and over again.
John Y.
midrange.com
