Modus themes version 1.6.0
By Protesilaos Stavrou <info@protesilaos.com> on 2021-07-15
This entry records the changes made to the project since the release of
version 1.5.0 on 2021-07-15. There have been around 70 commits since
then.
Every colour-related modification referenced herein is always
implemented in accordance with the primary accessibility objective of
the themes for a minimum contrast ratio of 7:1 between background and
foreground values in their given combination (the WCAG AAA standard).
Such edits also account for colour-coding that is optimised for the
needs of users with red-green colour deficiency (deuteranopia or
variants).
Here is the URL of the manual: <https://protesilaos.com/modus-themes>.
Or read it from Emacs by evaluating this form:
(info "(modus-themes) Top")
The themes are built into Emacs version 28 (current development target),
and are available on GNU ELPA as well as other archives. This release
is the final one for the emacs-28 branch, as that gets cut as the next
stable release of GNU Emacs. Future releases will target Emacs 29 once
that becomes the new 'master' branch.
Customisation options
=====================
[ Themes need to be reloaded for changes to take effect. ]
+ Introduced the new 'modus-themes-tabs-accented' boolean option. When
set to non-nil, it renders the background of all tab interfaces in a
shade of blue. Those interfaces are tab-bar (built-in), tab-line
(built-in), and Centaur tabs.
- The background "accented" colour is the same as the one used for
mode lines when 'modus-themes-mode-line' is configured accordingly.
+ Tweaked the 'modus-themes-mode-line' to accept a 'padded' symbol as
part of the list of properties it can read. This will increase the
spacing around the mode lines' text, making the line taller overall
but also more spacious.
Thanks to Manuel Uberti for making the proposal and providing feedback
in issue 228: <https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/228>.
+ Added the 'modus-themes-scale-small' which complements the existing
scale values with one that is meant to be smaller than the base
height. This option is reserved for special cases and is currently
only used as an opt-in feature in the Org agenda.
+ Expanded the 'modus-themes-org-agenda' with more parameters:
- The current date can now also be underlined.
- Date headings can be scaled/enlarged in size.
- Events, like those of the Diary or sexp entries, can be customised.
Consult the manual or the variable's doc string for the details.
+ Removed the obsoleted aliases 'modus-themes-slanted-constructs' and
'modus-themes-scale-5'. Those are superseded by the more
appropriately named 'modus-themes-italic-constructs' and
'modus-themes-scale-title'.
Thanks to Nicolas De Jaeghere for the patch in merge request 47:
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/merge_requests/47>.
Faces and face groups
=====================
+ Make the 'prodigy' faces for red/green/yellow inherit from the faces
'error'/'success'/'warning', respectively. This is done to (i) avoid
duplication and (ii) ensure that the green/success colour coding is
consistent with the goal of the themes to empower users with red-green
colour deficiency. The boolean option that changes all such greens to
shades of blue is 'modus-themes-success-deuteranopia'.
+ Assigned the ':extend' attribute to the 'org-code' face. This is
necessary when the Org source contains lines that start with a colon
sign. Those are interpreted as code blocks. For example:
: #+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
: (defun in-interval (bounds el)
: (and (>= el (car bounds)) (<= el (cadr bounds))))
: #+END_SRC
With the ':extend' in place, the background stretches to the edge of
the window, thus giving those lines a uniform rectangular shape. For
inline uses of 'org-code', the background should remain limited to the
span of the text.
+ Broadened support for 'marginalia' faces in two phases.
- The first pertained to the file permissions that are shown when
completing against file paths. Their style is similar to what
'dired+' or the 'direfl' packages provide, however we have taken
care to optimise the interface for the purposes of completion
UIs---where things can look like Dired, we make them alike, but
where they must differ, we differentiate the designs accordingly.
There can be no compromises or arbitrary constraints.
Also read: <https://github.com/minad/marginalia/pull/91>.
- The second batch covered all sorts of extra classes that provide
granular control over the appearance of Marginalia instances.
Refinements also had to be made to already-supported faces for the
sake of achieving consistency across the various Marginalia
interfaces.
Also read: <https://github.com/minad/marginalia/pull/92>.
+ Refined 'diredfl' and 'dired+' faces. For the various "priv" faces,
the intent is to increase the difference in hueness between adjacent
file permissions (the changes are minor, but they do change the
overall result). Numbers are toned down so that they do not clash
with dates. The file suffix no longer uses cyan to stand out more in
detailed views.
+ Made 'icomplete-selected-match' (Emacs28) more legible by aligning its
presentation with metaphors that are estaslished across the
modus-themes. Thanks to Kévin Le Gouguec (peniblec) for noting the
inconsistency with the new face upstream and for writing the patch for
it in merge request 50:
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/merge_requests/50>.
Also thanks to Manuel Uberti for confirming that things would look
consistent in the comments' section of that merge request.
+ Fixed faulty inheritance for the 'web-mode-keyword-face'. It should
now properly copy the attributes of 'font-lock-keyword-face'.
+ Made inheritance of the new 'help-key-binding' (Emacs28 key) the
default for all faces that need to style key bindings.
In Emacs 28 all key bindings are automatically displayed with the face
'help-key-binding' which uses some new face attributes to draw a
cleaner box around it. Given that the themes must work with earlier
versions of Emacs, we cannot inherit it unconditionally so we added
the relevant conditionality. It is nice to offer this feature to
those who use the themes on Emacs 28. Older versions retain the
previous style of a blue colour coupled with a bold weight.
The exception to this rule is the transient.el faces (this is the
pop-up window used by Magit, among others---transient.el is now built
into Emacs). The box effect creates unpredictable misalignments, so
we default to the old key binding style for those.
Thanks to Manuel Uberti and Kevin Fleming for their feedback in issue
232: <https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/232>.
+ Added support for the new 'notmuch-jump-key' face. I contributed this
face in commits c37c9912, 5cc106b0 to the Notmuch git repo:
<https://git.notmuchmail.org/git/notmuch>.
+ Updated the 'bookmark-face' (Emacs28) as it has been changed upstream
to be a fringe indicator instead of an in-buffer, line-wide background
highlight.
+ Aligned Ediff faces with other 'modus-themes-diffs' styles. Before we
would differentiate a "focus state", though that is now considered
surplus to requirements. The notion of a "focus state" only make
sense in Magit which applies variegated colour-coding to diff hunks
based on their state. Whereas non-active Ediff changes are grayed
out, so there is no need for further colour-coding nuances. The most
noticeable change is with:
(setq modus-themes-diffs 'bg-only)
As noted in the commit message of 64c74ae (from 2021-09-04):
If users think this change is for the worse, we can always define a
helper function like this:
(defun modus-themes--ediff-style (bgonly default)
"Diff style for Ediff.
BGONLY and DEFAULT depend on the value of `modus-themes-diffs'.
The former is more subtle."
(if (eq modus-themes-diffs 'bg-only)
(list bgonly)
(list default)))
And apply it thus:
`(ediff-current-diff-A ((,class :inherit ,@(modus-themes--ediff-style
'modus-themes-diff-removed
'modus-themes-diff-focus-removed))))
No feedback was received towards that end in about a month, so we
consider the change to be acceptable, without prejudice to the
possibility of future updates.
+ Unified the styles of 'org-agenda-calendar-sexp', 'org-agenda-diary',
and 'org-agenda-calendar-event'. This is not a user-facing change but
an internal refactoring to avoid repetition. It also makes things
easier for the implementation of the 'modus-themes-org-agenda' (as
mentioned above).
+ Ensured that the 'bookmark-menu-bookmark' face inherits from the
'bold' face. By default it hardcodes the bold weight, whereas we
instruct it to inherit the 'bold' face. A user can thus change the
':weight' of that face to whatever they want, like semibold,
extrabold, etc. We do this throughout the themes for bold and
italics---consider it a "hidden feature" of sorts. Check the manual
for more on the matter:
(info "(modus-themes) Configure bold and italic faces (DIY)")
+ Provided support for tab-bar groups (Emacs28). Specifically the faces
'tab-bar-tab-group-current' and 'tab-bar-tab-group-inactive'.
Thanks to Adam Porter (alphapapa) for the feedback in issue 8 over at
the Github mirror: <https://github.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/issues/8>.
+ Decoupled the 'stripes' face from that of 'hl-line-face'. This is
because the stripes are not meant to change depending on the value of
the user option 'modus-themes-hl-line'.
+ Revised the red shade of "flagged" entries in mu4e and notmuch. Those
are now consistent with Gnus. The shade of red that was used before
was closer to the orange side of the spectrum whereas the current has
hints of blue (a cherry colour) and thus combines better with the cyan
and blue that prevail in those interfaces. These are fine margins,
though the effect is noticeable regardless.
+ Configured the new 'ansi-color' faces (Emacs28) which are used by
shells and terminals (among others). Thanks to Manuel Uberti for
reporting the changes to upstream Emacs in issue 236:
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/236>.
+ Expanded support for EMMS faces, pertaining to its browser views.
Thanks to Feng Shu (tumashu) for bringing those to my attention in
issue 11 over at the Github mirror:
<https://github.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/issues/11>.
+ Styled the new 'tab-line-tab-modified' face (Emacs28). It should now
use a faint red colour to denote changes to the underlying file.
Thanks to Adam Porter (alphapapa) for bringing it to my attention in
issue 12 over at the Github mirror:
<https://github.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/issues/12>.
+ Configured the single face that the 'cursor-flash' package has to
offer. Thanks to Manuel Uberti for the feedback in issue 231:
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/231>.
+ Included 'elpher' in the list of supported packages by means of
covering the heading faces it implements.
+ Recalibrated certain dedicated colours for inactive tabs and tweaked
tab faces to (i) marginally improve the default aesthetic and (ii)
harmonise it with the style of 'modus-themes-tabs-accented'.
+ Removed the foreground attribute from all markup faces that are meant
to denote emphasis in italics. That is because such faces are
typically composed with others, so we do not wish to inadvertently
override any other colour that would otherwise have taken effect.
+ Wrote the faces for upstream Org that improve the contextuality of
various agenda views (included in version 9.5). This was done in
close collaboration with Gustavo Barros who offered detailed feedback
in issue 208 (which also led to the creation and eventual expansion of
the 'modus-themes-org-agenda' user option):
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/208>.
Four new faces improve certain styles and offer more flexibility for
some Org agenda views: 'org-agenda-date-weekend-today',
'org-imminent-deadline', 'org-agenda-structure-secondary',
'org-agenda-structure-filter'. They inherit from existing faces in
order to remain backward-compatible.
Quoting from <https://list.orgmode.org/87lf7q7gpq.fsf@protesilaos.com/>:
+ The 'org-imminent-deadline' is useful to disambiguate generic
warnings from deadlines. For example, a warning could be
rendered in a yellow colored text and have a bold weight,
whereas a deadline might be red and styled with italics.
+ The 'org-agenda-structure-filter' applies to all tag/term
filters in agenda views that search for keywords or patterns.
It is designed to inherit from 'org-agenda-structure' in
addition to the 'org-warning' face that was present before (and
removes the generic 'warning' face from one place). This offers
the benefit of consistency, as, say, an increase in font height
or a change in font family in 'org-agenda-structure' will
propagate to the filter as well. The whole header line thus
looks part of a singular design.
+ The 'org-agenda-structure-secondary' complements the above for
those same views where a description follows the header. For
instance, the tags view provides information to "Press N r" to
filter by a numbered tag. Themes/users may prefer to
disambiguate this line from the header above it, such as by
using a less intense color or by reducing its height relative to
the 'org-agenda-structure'.
+ The 'org-agenda-date-weekend-today' provides the option to
differentiate the current date on a weekend from the current
date on weekdays.
Other patches I have made to, inter alia, emacs.git and org.git with
regard to faces are documented in previous change log entries.
Documentation
=============
+ Removed references to old versions of the themes from before their
refactoring in version 1.0.0. Those old packages no longer exist.
Users must install the 'modus-themes' and then load either of
'modus-operandi' or 'modus-vivendi'.
+ Included various extensions of the Vertico package in the list of
indirectly supported packages. Those define faces which either
inherit from basic ones that we already support or use colours that
are consistent with our accessibility target.
+ Referenced 'side-hustle', 'tide', 'bufler' as an indirectly supported
packages for the same reasons.
+ Simplified time-stamp local variables that are used in modus-themes.el
to show the time the file was edited. We apply 'time-stamp-pattern'
instead of setting multiple time-stamp variables. Thanks to Stephen
Gildea for the patch, which was sent to me via email (yes, you can
always do that).
+ Updated the manual's "acknowledgements" section to name all new
contributors to code/ideas/feedback.
+ Furnished information on how to configure the 'highlight-parentheses'
package and extend its faces for use with the themes. The entry
provides a complete Elisp implementation.
+ Improved the code samples for the prism.el setup that users may wish
to set up by themselves. The new lists of colours work better when
Prism's colouration is limited to a small set of hues.
+ Deleted trailing whitespace in the manual which had adverse effects
when trying to compile the modus-themes.org over at emacs.git. Thanks
to Philip Kaludercic for the patch in merge request 49:
<https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/merge_requests/49>.
Thanks again to everyone involved. Looking forward to see the Modus
themes, version 1.6.0, as part of the next stable release of Emacs.