How to change text color in the PDE sketch console

Processing
1

How can I change the text color from red to white? I have bad eyes and I cannot read the contents of the console.

2

Dear Cath, welcome to the forum.

The text color in the console can’t be changed through the preferences, so it requires a little detour where we’ll have to make a change in a core file of Processing. If you have a Windows operating system, follow the steps below. To be on the safe side make sure Processing isn’t running.

  1. Find the file named theme.txt in the folder where you installed Processing. For me that’s C:\Program Files (x86)\processing-3.5.3\lib. Copy the path to this folder.

  2. Open the Command Prompt on your Windows computer as an administrator.

  3. In your Command Prompt, type cd followed by the path you copied in step 1. In my situation it’s cd C:\Program Files (x86)\processing-3.5.3\lib. Press enter.

  4. Type theme.txt and press enter again. Your text editor should open.

  5. Press control + f to open your search function and type #d9211e. This is the color code used for the console errors. Change it to any hex code you prefer, such as #f0f0f0.

  6. Save your changes, open Processing, and test whether you like the new color.

A downside of this method is that updating/reinstalling Processing probably resets the core files, meaning you have to execute these steps again. To save time in the future you could copy theme.txt to another location on your computer, and paste it back whenever Processing resets the core files.

Hopefully this solves your problem. If you have any questions please let me know.

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3

Given that this is an accessibility issue, it might be worth opening a feature request to add console color/size to preferences in the future? Accessibility is part of the Foundation mission …

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4

additionally to the above shown color adjustments:

are you aware that you can adjust the size for the whole processing IDE 3.5.3 window
AND the text size to editor and console area separate?

here shown on a WIN 10 with Interface scale 150% and console font size 18

processing_consoletextsize
processing_consoletextsize1408×887 89.3 KB

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6

hi @JoeGeun
on what system you tested this?

from a Win 10:

processing-3.5.3\lib\theme.txt

# CONSOLE
# The font is handled by preferences, so its size/etc are modifiable.
console.color = #000000
console.output.color = #cccccc
# text color for errors printed in the console
console.error.color = #d9211e

c:\Users\ < user >\AppData\Roaming\Processing\preferences.txt

console.font.size=12
7

Thanks everyone … I will give all this a try.

8

Perhaps a bit of topic, but is there anyone specifically in charge of Processing’s accessibility? I might be interesting in providing assistance there.

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9

That would be great! I’m not sure, but maybe contact people involved in p5.accessibility to ask–I’m not sure if that is a purely p5.js initiative or also on the PDE / Java side.

Possibly see also Processing Voluntary Product Accessibility Template (V.P.A.T.)

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