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I just can't read.

Posted: 25 Mar 2017 23:09
by paooolino
Hello, this is my first post here.
I am a web programmer.
I just can't read the forum. How can you read yellow on grey? it's extremely hard.
Plus, font is sooo little.
It's just me or my browser? I'm using Google Chrome.
A good CSS style may dramatically improve readability.
I could do it, obviously for free.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 01:52
by kamnet
You can pick another forum style here: ucp.php?i=165

You can also adjust the font size in your web browser.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 07:48
by Chrill
It does sound a lot like you, not the website. Dark yellow on grey is very easy to read, although the dark yellow is only for links and titles.

You're free to have a go at a new forum design, Owen may choose to use it if he likes it. Like kamnet stated, other designs are available.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 08:39
by narrow
Should have gone to an optician :wink:

Now seriously

You may have an eye problem, many people have colur blindness to different colours, as for font size as said that can be remided by adjusting your browser but there again you may need 'glasses'.

Book an appointment at an opticians.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 08:43
by paooolino
Cool. I picked another style. Thankyou for the tip!

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 11:12
by Hyronymus
paooolino wrote:Cool. I picked another style. Thankyou for the tip!
Question remains: are we getting an improved theme from you?

Re: RE: Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 26 Mar 2017 11:37
by paooolino
Hyronymus wrote:
paooolino wrote:Cool. I picked another style. Thankyou for the tip!
Question remains: are we getting an improved theme from you?
Well, I could work on it, I'd be happy to contribute.
Just notify me for any guidelines or desiderata and how to submit it to any mod. Otherwise I'll write here when done.

Inviato dal mio HTC One M9 utilizzando Tapatalk

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 27 Mar 2017 07:42
by paooolino
according to this

https://snook.ca/technical/colour_contr ... ,bg=848484

color contrast ratio between #FCC000 and #848484 is only 2.26 which is not compliant with the required 4.5 for normal text (WCAG 2.0 https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/)

Please note readability may be also affected by environmental light or current screen brightness settings.

In my case I can read rather well today, from my office desktop, but in the evening with my laptop is quite a nightmare.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 27 Mar 2017 09:10
by Pilot
Interesting, I've never had an issue with it myself, and I've never seen this pop up before. Personally, I've found the Yellow against the grey easier to read than the black in most light, but maybe that's just me. Yellow is something that stands out in my opinion.
paooolino wrote:Please note readability may be also affected by environmental light or current screen brightness settings.
Surely you've gotten the brightness settings wrong then if you can't read it? My phone auto-adjusts screen brightness based on the lighting around it, and like I said before, I've never had the issue. Even just now testing my laptop in direct sunshine (Sunshine in Manchester, ha, I know! It's fake news people :lol: ), I could read the yellow on grey just as easily as the black on grey, or even black on white.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 27 Mar 2017 09:19
by paooolino
Yeah I see. Plus, the fact is that I navigate the forum when my eyes are tired yet :-)

I think it's a problem of these particular shade of gray and yellow. Probably a lighter yellow and a darker gray will work - or a darker yellow with a brighter gray, just to give more distance between colors.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 27 Mar 2017 09:28
by Pilot
It'd be interesting to see what you develop if you decide to go down that path, if it's good enough, I'm sure that Owen would consider it.

Also, before you get too annoyed at the normal theme, I present to you, the Christmas Theme! That theme has a lot of users hating upon it :lol:

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 27 Mar 2017 10:12
by WWTBAM
There is also the not so well known easter theme.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 28 Mar 2017 09:31
by orudge
Unfortunately the Easter theme is still stuck in the days of phpBB 2.x, I haven't yet got around to updating it.

Ideally I need the theme rewritten entirely for phpBB 3.1, to be based on proSilver rather than subSilver, as subSilver is no longer supported and will not receive any further updates. Finding the time to do this however is more difficult. I think kamnet mentioned ages ago that he could possibly help prepare a new theme, I'll maybe need to look into it or ask for volunteers...

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 29 Mar 2017 19:01
by kamnet
orudge wrote:Unfortunately the Easter theme is still stuck in the days of phpBB 2.x, I haven't yet got around to updating it.

Ideally I need the theme rewritten entirely for phpBB 3.1, to be based on proSilver rather than subSilver, as subSilver is no longer supported and will not receive any further updates. Finding the time to do this however is more difficult. I think kamnet mentioned ages ago that he could possibly help prepare a new theme, I'll maybe need to look into it or ask for volunteers...
Yep, I'm still volunteering for that as well. I suppose I could just set up phpBB 3.1 on my server (or Owen could nicely just copy over some files for me to play with ;) ) and I can look at this possibly this weekend.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 15 Jul 2018 00:58
by Andrex
I switched to the white theme 16 years ago, because I also found the other one unreadable.

The new phpBB version has a clean and neat default theme, also buttons no longer use GIFs, the layout for mobile display is much better and security has been improved of course... here I have a forum running latest version, with the default style.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 24 Jul 2018 15:05
by YNM
I've been on this forum for a good 6 years, since I'm a teenager, and it's still fine on the usual green/grey temperate theme.

Keep in mind that readability is not just about the contrast, it's also the font - size, thickness and form also matters.

If you struggle with black & (darkened) yellow on grey, an easy fix would be larger fonts - zoom in to the site - or if it's still annoys you, you can opt for a different theme.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 19 Jun 2019 11:14
by eekee
Old thread, I know, but I just saw it today and thought I'd mention a few things. Apart from color blindness, there are huge variations in how different people see red, which is a component of yellow. Some people have a whole extra set of cone cells for seeing more shades of red. The gene for this is carried on the X chromosome so it's more common in women than men, but some men do have it. I think I have.

As for laptops, I also have more trouble with this site on my laptop than my desktop, but in my case tired eyes and bad light are not to blame. I use my laptop in the middle of the day, in a room with much more suitable lighting than my usual. I believe my laptop has a screen which suffers from contrast issues. Most of my phones definitely suffer from contrast issues, but my latest doesn't seem so bad.

In actual practice, this site is not a problem because I use a browser extension: Dark Reader. It doesn't look as sweet as the normal theme, but I get to see the lovely temperate background with adequately high-contrast text, links included.

You know what? I like making themes, but haven't had a good reason to for ages. I'd like to make skins for this board. I don't want to set up a server myself, so I'll pop over to the user site request thread in a minute.
Edit: Or maybe it's not hard to set up.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 19 Jun 2019 13:19
by Redirect Left
eekee wrote: 19 Jun 2019 11:14 You know what? I like making themes, but haven't had a good reason to for ages. I'd like to make skins for this board. I don't want to set up a server myself, so I'll pop over to the user site request thread in a minute.
Edit: Or maybe it's not hard to set up.
If you'd like, I can setup an instance of phpBB on my server and give you the details needed to login to it, if you cahnot find another way of doing it.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 22 Jun 2019 02:13
by kamnet
We already have a test server set up for developing the theme. Just talk to Owen about gaining access to it.

Re: I just can't read.

Posted: 22 Jun 2019 16:02
by orudge
Yep, this is in hand. :)