about dark-background-light-text-extension

[b16r05]

Hi Gitoffthelawn,

I am wondering if there has been any progress with dark-background-light-text-extension. I saw that you created multiple issues; one mentioned is here: m-khvoinitsky/dark-background-light-text-extension#256

My main beef with it is that it is resource heavy for some reason. You mentioned there is a lot of unnecessary code injection amongst other things. I wonder if there will be update from the dev, or if you will release (take it over), or if you both are working on it? Any place to follow progress (links), I would appreciate.

Thank you!

[Gitoffthelawn]

Hi b16r05,

Great questions!

I have the same experience as you. DBLT is an excellent project, but it can be very resource-intensive, especially in Stylesheet Processor mode. The Simple CSS mode is fast, but does not work well for many sites. The Invert mode, in my experience, makes text hard to read and has many issues with images.

I would love to have the time to work on it more or to fork it. I simply have not had ample time, and I doubt I will have time to work on it alone anytime soon.

I do plan on making time to provide the fixes for the issues I posted. Although I do expect some performance and memory improvements from providing those fixes, I don't expect tremendous gains.

You can follow progress by monitoring those issues and the pull requests for that repo.

I have spent many hours investigating what is necessary to generate effective and reliable dark user interfaces for websites and extensions. I am willing to work with a team to help with any of the following:

1. Create a native feature for Firefox to support dark modes for websites and extensions
2. Work with website developers and extension authors to support dark modes
3. Create a new dark mode extension
4. Improve any of the existing dark mode extensions

Because applying a dark mode is a processor-intensive procedure, baking it into the browser makes a lot of good sense.

What I have done is create custom themes/styles in CSS for several websites and other extensions to create dark user interfaces. I was surprised at the extent of the challenges of accomplishing this, and learned quite a bit about the issues involved and their solutions.

[b16r05]

Thank you for replying! I am kind of a dark mode fanatic : )

I was using styish, and now stylus: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/styl-us/

User styles has a lot of styles for different webpages pages: https://userstyles.org/, in case you need inspiration or help :) I am sure you are familar with all of this.

Comparing stylus and DBLT, what I like about the latter is that every page has a standard theme -- background and color, which can be set by the user and is standard across all websites. With the former, you get different colors, textures, etc. depending on the style used. One good thing about stylus is that not only can you change background and font color, but also change how the pages are set up. Example is Wikipedia deep dark theme, which is awesome, even better than wikiwand : ) https://userstyles.org/styles/122072/wikipedia-deep-dark-theme

DBLT looks great on all websites, I just wish it wasn't so slow! But, I understand that there are challenges. It would be nice if there was an update from the dev or if dark theming gets picked up by Mozilla!

My skills are basic... otherwise, I would have helped!

[Gitoffthelawn]

You're welcome!

I unfortunately don't have time right now to reply in detail, but I agree with everything you wrote (and for the same reasons).

I've been dealing with some eye issues recently (probably a result of too much time focusing on a screen), and I found dark modes to be much easier on my eyes. I have been surprised by the limited amount of dark modes available in software and on Internet websites. As such, I have put in the effort to create dark modes for approximately 85% of the tools and sites I frequently use.

CSS is a good language to learn, and Mozilla provides an excellent free reference:
https://developer.mozilla.org/docs/Learn/CSS

I personally find it a rather enjoyable language.

I can teach you some of the tricks for successful dark theming.

Which DBLT mode are you using as the default? Which OS and processor (CPU) do you use the most?

[b16r05]

I understand; no problem.

Thank you for the link. Yes, i was going to say also that I should learn CSS... maybe I will try on codecademy : ) https://www.codecademy.com/learn/learn-css

I am sorry to hear about your eye issues.

I use stylUS and userstyles... and it works well for the most part.

I am using Windows 10 and CPU is i7 Haswell.

I think if I knew CSS, I could edit some outdated userstyles or create my own.

I have DBLT on default setting, but I disable it for particular websites. I did not even notice the other options.

I would like to have it OFF by default and only ON when I want to, i.e. when there is no website dark theme and no user style available. Is there a way to configure DBLT this way?