Re: [gentoo-dev] use of color

[Collins Richey]

[ snips ]

On Sat, 14 Jul 2001 11:12:55 -0700 Gontran <gontran@×××××××.net> wrote:

> * Collins Richey (erichey2@××××.com) wrote:
> > The shell and many of the tools on Gentoo use color which choice I
> find to
> > be absolutely worthless however popular this bit of eye candy may be
> for
> > others.  On XFCE the default background for Terminal makes the color
> > displays almost illegible.
> >
> > Could someone post instructions to find and kill the color settings,
> ie
> > shell prompt, man, and any other tools that use color setting.
>

> Now if you're using sh for your shell, you may want to look at
> /etc/profile
> and hack about in those conditions at the 'export PS1' lines.
>

> Or you could just change your default environment variable PAGER from
> 'most' to 'less' (sounds like a bad idea doesn't it?).
>

> Now to add a counter opinion: I find the use of color in all aspects of
> Gentoo
> not only tremendously refreshing but valuable.

Thanks, Gontran, this is just what I needed.

I agree with you wholeheartedly.  For the vast majority of users,
colorization adds a really spiffy, professional touch.  For me -
colorblind and less than 20-20 eyesight - the color is an irritant, and it
renders illegible certain essential bits of info.  Therefor, a plain
vanilla screen is a very good thing (tm).

So now I have  
     export PS1='\u@\h \W #' for root
     export PS1='\u@\h \W $' for others
     export PAGER='/usr/bin/less'
And I am overjoyed with the results.

BTW, this also corrects a Gentooism that is IMHO in very poor taste - the
standard Gentoo setup does not differentiate the root/other prompt with
#/$ as does every other distro in the known universe.

Thanks again for your help,
-- 
Collins Richey
Denver Area
Gentoo_rc5 XFCE