Ncurses colors


 
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# 1  
Old 12-12-2014
Ncurses colors

I am using ncurses to develop a user interface. Perhaps I should be using something else, but I am reasonably comfortable with ncurses and don't really want to climb another learning curve at this time.

One problem I have dealt with for many years is ncurses' colors. I have simply been unable to affect the standard colors that are inherent to the code. Specifically, at least a couple of the standard colors look like they have been washed in mud!

COLOR_WHITE, when used as a background, is a light grey. Using a color_pair of COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_WHITE results in dark grey letters on a light grey background.

OTOH, COLOR_WHITE,COLOR_RED has nice bright white letters on a nice red background.

The standard COLOR_YELLOW looks like mustard, not a bright yellow like I would desire.

init_color doesn't seem to have any effect at all.

I have collected sample of what ncurses gives me in the attachment. To illustrate my dislike of the ncurses colors, I have embedded the samples in a background of the same colors as GIMP supplies. The black text labeling each piece was supplied via GIMP.

Suggestions?
Ncurses colors-colorsamplepng

Last edited by BillLee; 12-12-2014 at 11:37 AM.. Reason: Added words
# 2  
Old 12-12-2014
Hi BillLee...

I am not familiar with ncurses but to get an extended range to the colours in the shell the __bold__ attribute has be on...

I assume that there is a BOLD attribute for ncurses...

This is an example, note the second loop might not work in some terminals...
Code:
#!/bin/bash
# colours.sh
n=0
for fg in {30..37}
do
	for bg in {40..47}
	do
		for bold in 0 1
		do
			# 1 = bold ON.
			printf "\x1B["$bold";"$bg";"$fg"m Line $n, bold = $bold, background = $bg, foreground = $fg...\x1B[0m\n"
			n=$((n+1))
		done
	done
done
for fg in {90..97}
do
	for bg in {100..107}
	do
		for bold in 0 1
		do
			# 1 = bold ON.
			printf "\x1B["$bold";"$bg";"$fg"m Line $n, bold = $bold, background = $bg, foreground = $fg...\x1B[0m\n"
			n=$((n+1))
		done
	done
done


Last edited by wisecracker; 12-12-2014 at 07:22 PM.. Reason: Added bold to the code.
These 2 Users Gave Thanks to wisecracker For This Post:
# 3  
Old 12-12-2014
Thanks for the reply.

I failed to note that all of the ncurses text in my example was in bold font.
# 4  
Old 12-12-2014
That are alot of lines...
Mine's not that esay share-able :|
But imho much more overseeable. Smilie

The script will not run without TUI.
Code:
#!/bin/bash
# myColors
# Description:	a little color demonstration
# ------------------------------------------------------
#
#	Variables
#
	R=$(tui-conf-get /etc/tui/colors.conf TUI_COLOR_RESET)
	R=${R/^ /}
	TC=TUI_COLOR_
	TF=TUI_FONT_
	colors="BLACK BLUE CYAN GREEN GREY PURPLE RED WHITE YELLOW"
	styles="BOLD  UNDERSCORE STROKE " #  INVERT
#
#	Functions
#
	be_color() { # STRING_NAME
	# Returns the value of STRING_NAME
	# Expects strings like: TUI_COLOR_[BF]G_<NAME> or TUI_FONT_<STYLE>
		tui-conf-get /etc/tui/colors.conf $1
	}
#
#	Display & Action
#
	tui-title "Color demonstation using tui color names"
	for font in $colors;do
	# This is the font color, and shall be used for the whole line
		F="$(be_color ${TC}FG_${font})"
		for sty in $styles;do
			S="$(be_color ${TF}${sty})"
			for col in $colors;do
				# This is the back color, used for the column
				B="$(be_color ${TC}BG_${col})"
				C="${R}${F}${B}" # Closer
				a="${TC}FG_${font} \t${TF}${sty}"
				# Regular output
				printf "${C}a${S}style"
			done
			printf "$R -- $a \n"
		done
	done

Ncurses colors-tui-bash-colorsjpg

Last edited by sea; 12-12-2014 at 09:03 PM..
# 5  
Old 12-12-2014
Again, thanks for the response, but I don't see how this addresses my original question: what do I need to do to make ncurses display reasonable colors?
# 6  
Old 12-12-2014
And, supporting wisecracker's suggestion, from the curs_color(3X) man page on OS X:
Code:
       Several caveats apply on  386  and  486  machines  with  VGA-compatible
       graphics:

       -    COLOR_YELLOW  is  actually brown.  To get yellow, use COLOR_YELLOW
            combined with the A_BOLD attribute.
       ... ... ...

# 7  
Old 12-13-2014
Hello BillLee
This is some code from a long time ago. Dont use C much anymore. If you're not using C this might not help. I hope it does though.
Code:
int
StartColors ()
{
  start_color ();

  init_pair (0, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (1, COLOR_CYAN, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (2, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLUE);
  init_pair (3, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (4, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_RED);
  init_pair (5, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_GREEN);
  /*
  init_pair (0, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (DIR_NORM, COLOR_CYAN, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (DIR_HI, COLOR_BLUE, COLOR_WHITE);
  init_pair (FIL_NORM, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (FIL_HI, COLOR_RED, COLOR_WHITE);
  init_pair (5, COLOR_BLACK, COLOR_GREEN);
  init_pair (6, COLOR_MAGENTA, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (7, COLOR_BLUE, COLOR_CYAN);
  init_pair (8, COLOR_RED, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (9, COLOR_BLUE, COLOR_CYAN);
  init_pair (10, COLOR_GREEN, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (12, COLOR_CYAN, COLOR_BLACK);
  init_pair (13, COLOR_BLUE, COLOR_WHITE);
  init_pair (14, COLOR_YELLOW, COLOR_CYAN);
  init_pair (15, COLOR_WHITE, COLOR_BLUE);
  init_pair (16, COLOR_YELLOW, COLOR_CYAN);
  init_pair (17, COLOR_BLUE, COLOR_WHITE);
  init_pair (18, COLOR_YELLOW, COLOR_RED);
  init_pair (19, COLOR_YELLOW, COLOR_BLACK);
  */

  return (0);
}



int
WbkgdSet (WINDOW * w, chtype c)
{
  if (has_colors ())
    {
      wbkgdset (w, c);
    }
  else
    {
      c &= ~A_BOLD;
      if (c == COLOR_PAIR (1) ||
      c == COLOR_PAIR (2) ||
      c == COLOR_PAIR (3) || c == COLOR_PAIR (4) || c == COLOR_PAIR (5))
    {

      wattrset (w, A_REVERSE);
    }
      else
    {
      wattrset (w, 0);
    }
    }
}

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