I agree it would be great to have a “Dark” mode. It would be better to allow the user to set the colors for this mode. For now I use black background and white text. But some may not want white text, they might want blue. Best for the user to decide this. But, have a menu choice and a tool bar button to turn this on/off would be excellent!
I would love this. Right now I have a bastardized version that I have cobbled together that could really use some improvement. Every application should have a Dark Mode, and Scrivener is no different.
A Dark Mode would be great.
By the way, do you know about f.lux? It’s amazing to avoid eye strain et al.
justgetflux.com/
Windows 10 has a f.lux-type feature built in; it’s called Night Light. You can toggle it in the Action Center. Though I suppose that’s a moot point for anyone still using Windows 7… That being said, a Dark Mode in Scrivener/the ability to change UI colors would be very much appreciated!
The three recent posts by KB on this page may be helpful in this discussion (best to read the one towards the top of the page first in order to make sense of the second and third).
Just to add another experience point here.
I’ve had severe Type 2 Diabetes which though entirely arrested, leaves me with some eye problems (and memory of when they were worse).
- Flux is a great thing, and improved in the latest version
- A night/dark mode really needs to hit all the areas of the screen, or you still get difficulties
- I’d also support the idea of allowing greyscale, even color choice for what the ‘dark’ and ‘white’ presentations are, as these can also be very helpful.
It’s hard to describe the experience, but it’s one you don’t want, to ‘overload’ eyes that come to lack any reserves to deal with glare or the kinds of variable resolution problems that come with severe enough retinopathy. And the figures keep going up for diabetes, which you don’t have to have eating faults to incur.
A great thing if Scrivener can help out…as I type on my Flux-night-reconstituted screen. Medicine is good; being able to set up screens as you need them is right in there with it, particularly as sight varies over a day and between days.
Many thanks.
Second that
I use Flux and its not anywhere close to the same thing as having a “Dark/Night” mode. Besides, my so called dark-mode is setup all the time because it is easier on the eyes. Unfortunately, we can’t change the bookmark panel “Inspector” color or associated backgrounds. Although we can change the editor background (mine is black), we can’t change its panel color when minimizing or hiding the Inspector.
Why is any of this important? Because white reflects the most blue light back to the retina and overtime can damage it. This is why choosing your own colors is most helpful since everyone has different sensitivity to blue light. So again, my suggestion is to have a dark mode with the user selecting the colors of the three panels, fonts, and backgrounds. Ability to turn it on/off via menu/ button on the bar. Users will appreciate this feature.
I’ll put my vote in for dark mode as well. It’s my default mode in the iOS app, and in every app that will allow it (and I use the HackerVision extension in Chrome to give dark mode to most web pages). F.lux is a big help, but not quite enough.
I think this would be a killer feature for desktop. I have fallen in love with dark interfaces when it comes to creative work. (Part of it is doing design and video in a darker or shady environment. Part of it has become making the actual canvas the center of contrast dominance, which helps focus attention.
Here are two scope-narrowing ideas:
1/ Have preset themes—light and dark to start with, dark-gray and light-gray added if/when feasible.
2/ Have the settings affect only the app chrome. (The workspace settings for binder colors, etc.seem quite amply covered in the app settings).
I’m not an OSX coder, so I don’t know how difficult it is to stray away from what Apple devtools provides for apps. And I’m 18 years away from the Windows (NT) world.
I offer as an example implementation what Adobe has done for InDesign. I don’t hold Adobe up as paragons of app development, but I have to say I have fallen in love with apps that offer this feature.
Also, here’s what Serif Labs has implemented in Affinity Photo.
I love Scrivener already. It’s the bee’s knees! This feature would make it, I don’t know, the bee’s well-turned ankles as well.
But do read what KB, the sole developer for Scrivener for MacOS and iOS says on the subject:
What Adobe can throw at the problem in terms of staff or money—or probably Serif for that matter—is different, and as they are both graphic software companies, producing the necessary graphic elements is part of their core business. Things are very different for KB and Literature & Latte.
Mark
I’d vote for a dark mode as well. I use one whenever possible.
Hey all,
Can someone point me to the post where KB put this up to a vote? I’ve searched and searched and I can’t find it.
Hey cool. Do the themes in this thread work for Windows Scrivener, too?
Not necessarily a fix for Scrivener having a dark theme, but I just ran across Negative Screen app which will toggle between a dark and light mode across all of Windows. Kind of like the Windows Magnifying inverting of colors, but it will keep colors where it can and only target greyscale for inversion. I’ve been playing with it and so far, it works pretty well. It has settings for everything from oversaturated colors to full greyscale and inverted greyscale.
zerowidthjoiner.net/negativescreen
Free and open source.
I tried it out with Beta3.0 and the default Smart Color setting is not too shabby.
Oh wow, love that youngheart80! The results are quite good.
I hope we can get a native dark mode though, at some point. And more options for composition mode (font changes, more background options like a color selector?)
Windows 10 has a built-in workaround in Accessibility settings. Under “Color & High Contrast” you can turn on Color Filters, and select “Invert”. Then you can toggle between normal and “dark” themes by using Windows key + Ctrl + C
It isn’t much use if you’re working with photos since they appear in negative!
What I try to do at night is work in composition mode as much as possible. You can set the colours to anything you like in Scrivener settings. I use green text on dark green background with a darkish background image.
I also put in a vote for this! The ability to change UI colours and sizes would be even better!
I don’t think so.
Yes, definitely has my vote. I have everything dark via customization, but an official (and good looking) dark theme would be very welcome indeed.