Re: white-on-black or black-on-white?

[Aron Griffis <agriffis@xxxxxxxxx>]

Patrick Shanahan wrote:  [Tue Sep 11 2007, 08:53:27AM EDT]
> *default* is the definition of mutt's color table, not xterm's, and
> mutt prevails.

I think this depends on whether mutt is compiled against slang or
ncurses.  In my experience, when mutt is compiled against slang, it
forces the background color to either white or black.  When mutt is
compiled against ncurses, then "default" allows the background to
remain as-is.

I switch between black-on-white and white-on-black xterms regularly.
Using mutt with ncurses allows this to happen flawlessly.  I don't
have to make any changes to my color scheme.

  color attachment brightblue default
  color hdrdefault magenta default
  color indicator black cyan
  color markers brightred default
  color normal default default
  color quoted green default
  color signature magenta default
  color status white blue
  color tilde blue default
  color tree blue default

  # links
  color body brightblue default '[\-\.+_a-zA-Z0-9]+@[\-\.a-zA-Z0-9]+'
  color body brightblue default '(https?|ftp)://[\-\.,/%~_:?&=\#a-zA-Z0-9]+'

  # quotes
  color body blue default " *^[A-Za-z0-9]*[>|#:}].*"
  color body green default " *^[>|#:}] *[A-Za-z0-9]*[>|#:}].*"

  # diffs
  color body red default '^-.*'
  color body blue default '^\+.*'
  color body magenta default '^@.*'
  color body yellow default '^Modified: .*'
  color body yellow default '^==================================================

  # *Bold*  -- will not work if split over lines
  color body red default "\\*+[A-Za-z']+([ \n][A-Za-z']+)*\\*+"
  # _Underlined_ -- will not work if split over lines
  color body red default " _[A-Za-z']+([ \n][A-Za-z']+)*_"
  # /Italics/  -- will not work if split over lines
  color body red default " /[A-Za-z']+([ \n][A-Za-z']+)*/"

On a slight tangent, I've never seen a case where using slang works
better than ncurses.  I can't understand why it was ever introduced
into mutt.  I'd rather just see it go away, esp. since that would open
the door for mutt to use some of the more advanced features of
ncurses, as Thomas Dickey mentioned earlier.

Aron