Tweaks to the DOS Terminal theme

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The DOS Terminal theme by Shellnut / @Zee63 is awesome, so I wanted to share how I’ve tweaked it to make it even better.

There are a handful of things I wanted to change:

A - Scroll bars are way too dark. They’re barely even visible.

B - Binder text is white when it should be green to fit the theme.

C - The main editor text is blue. This is a valid choice, but I like green better.

D - The background is grey, but black looks better.

C and D are easy to change in settings. File > Options > Appearance > Main Editor > Colors. Text and Fixed Width Background are the ones to change.

A and B are more difficult to address because they require editing the .qss file. I’ll help make it easy.

Right click the .scrtheme file > 7-Zip > Open Archive

Right click the .qss file > Edit

The .qss file should open in Notepad. Scroll to the bottom, hit Enter twice, and paste this:

QScrollBar:horizontal {
   background: black;
   padding-left: 14px;
   padding-right: 14px;
}

QScrollBar::handle:horizontal {
   background: #232a24;
   min-width: 16px;
}

QScrollBar:vertical {
   background: black;
   padding-top: 14px;
   padding-bottom: 14px;
}

QScrollBar::handle:vertical {
   background: #232a24;
   min-height: 16px;
}

SCRBinder QAbstractScrollArea {color: #25ed69;}

The first four sections turn black scroll bars into the same grey that’s used elsewhere in the theme, making them much easier to see.

The padding prevents the scroll bar from travelling so far that it covers the scroll arrows when you’re at the top or bottom of a page.

The min-height and min-width prevent the scroll bar from getting too small when there’s a ton of stuff to scroll through.

And the last line turns the binder font colour to a green that’s also used for other text in the theme.

Here’s what it looks like. Though keep in mind I haven’t applied the .prefs file from the DOS Terminal theme, since I’m iffy on Shellnut’s font choices.

dos terminal with changes
dos terminal with changes1920×1003 85 KB

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Scrivener 3 Themes (Windows)
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Like it. A monospaced font is very much part of the DOS-style, and Times or Georgia is certainly not. But anyone can replace the fonts to their liking, of course…

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Thanks for posting these tips! I think they would be useful to anyone looking to make a little adjustment here or there to something they otherwise like.

I have split it to its own thread, as I’m trying to keep the main one you posted to a “gallery” rather than a general how-to discussion thread.

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Good point. I usually write in courier prime, but I took the screenshot in georgia. I didn’t want to inject another one of my preferences into this when the main font is so easy to customize, unlike the scroll bar colour and the binder font colour.

For the UI font, I think the default segoe is serviceable in this theme, even though it’s not monospaced. Though perhaps there’s a monospaced font that would look better than both segoe and aldrich (the primary font prescribed by the DOS Terminal theme’s .prefs file).

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@weirdo, thanks again for posting your mods to DOS Terminal and the detailed instructions for implementing them.

I noticed a small bug in how the theme behaves on my install.

All is well when first launched:

image
image1920×1044 158 KB

I move away from the Binder, by clicking on Search Results or a Collection. The binder-side text color reverts back to the default colors. (I assume from the default theme or from Shellnut’s original theme? I’m thinking this is expected behavior, as we only changed SCRBinder color?)

image
image1920×1045 153 KB

When I click back to the Binder, the Binder text colors have also reverted back to the “default” colors. This is the “bug”.

image
image1917×1043 137 KB

Closing & reopening Scrivener fixes it, until the next click away from the Binder.

@weirdo, are you seeing this on your install? @AntoniDol, any ideas?

Best,
Jim

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@AntoniDol, I think you mention this bug in your book, in the collections section.

Notice the Binder Item colors are incorrect after switching on Collections. These will revert to normal colors after an application restart.

Were you ever able to find a workaround for this?

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AFAIK, the Binder color are controlled by code to provide a Kindle-like attempt to keep it always readable. Leaving the Search results or Collections seems to activate this code. A restart will reinstate the Theme colors, until…

Not much you can do about that in the Theme, I’m afraid.

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I appreciate the explanation.

Even built-in Mellow Yellow suffers from this defect. :frowning: Probably any theme with overridden/colored (non-white or non-black) binder item names will also. This possibly explains why Shellnut’s original DOS Terminal theme did not override the color of binder item names.

Oh well. :man_shrugging:

Best,
Jim

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