On Sun, Apr 20, 2008 at 12:51 PM, Andrew Lentvorski <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> All right, I finally got tired of "uber cool white text on black background
> websites". So, I needed to go look for something to take care of it. What
> I found is called a "bookmarklet" generator:
>
> http://www.squarefree.com/userstyles/make-bookmarklet.html
>
> And I used the default "Zap colors" bookmarklet. It does *exactly* what I
> want. It's now firmly ensconced on my main toolbar.
>
> Now, one thing I still don't quite seem to get. Everybody *claims* that
> white-on-black is more readable. Yet why does my experience disagree?
>
> Why do I find the white-on-black websites to be so much less readable?
Probably because the character weights (line thickness) have been
tuned for black characters on white background. That is how they were
developed over several centuries, starting with hand-inscribed ink on
vellum, and progressing through generations of printed ink on paper.
Analogous problems arise with fonts for electrostatic printers, since
some print engines inherently write black-on-white and others are
white-on-black. I remember a lot of problems of this type (pun
semi-intended) in early laser printer days, maybe 1980 +- a few years.
I am sure that readable character fonts white-on-black could be
developed, but mostly nobody has done that. Perhaps the VT100
character set is an exception.
carl
--
carl lowenstein marine physical lab u.c. san diego
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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