PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

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Impress
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PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Impress »

PDF-XChange Editor is very customizable.

My favorite customization is setting it to display PDFs using a dark background with light text. This really helps my eyes.

But the one thing that seems to be missing is to apply a dark theme to PDF-XChange Editor UI itself.

I've tried setting dark background colors for the menu bar, ribbons, and dialog boxes, but the result is unsatisfactory because PDF-XChange Editor tries to display black text and dark icons on the dark backgrounds.

I would love for PDF-XChange Editor to support a dark theme.

I have extensive education and experience with optic and neural physiology, which has made me quite good at create dark themes for user interfaces. I'm willing to help if your team would appreciate assistance.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, Impress

While we are not looking for additional UI design assitance at the moment, Thank you for the offer. You will be happy to know that our requests for an official dark theme have been heard and the Dev team is currently working on implementing that for us. I have not heard confirmation if it will be ready in time for the next release, but it should be coming soon, likely in one of the next few releases following.

Kind regards,
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by igorlima »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Mon Sep 06, 2021 4:51 pm Hello, Impress

(...) our requests for an official dark theme have been heard and the Dev team is currently working on implementing that for us. I have not heard confirmation if it will be ready in time for the next release, but it should be coming soon, likely in one of the next few releases following.
(...)

Kind regards,
Sorry to comment on this topic with nothing to add, but I just want to say that I'm really glad to read that! Thank you! :D
Igor
PDF-XChange Editor fan :)
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PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

:)
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Jensen Head »

As I understand it, the black UI theme has been added:

Image

(the screenshot is not mine) However, in the PDF-XChange Standard V9 User Manual (Last Updated: 07/23/2021) nothing is found for the word "theme" ("The search has finished. No matches were found"). In "Customize Toolbars" / "Commands" for the word "theme" there is only "Customize Theme ... (Customize UI theme - colors, fonts, background, etc."). This button opens the "Customize User Interface Appearance" tab of the application settings, but assigning a black background to the panel color becomes #7F7F7F instead of black.

Windows 10 has a dark color theme, but I couldn't find in the app settings how to enable inheritance of the OS theme?
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Willy Van Nuffel »

Most probably, the Tracker Support team is already working with the pre-release of the next build.

In the current release 9.1.356.0, I can not get the background of the dialog-boxes to black neither.

Kind regards.

Willy

@Tracker Support:
any news about "themes", and especially the "black" theme ?
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, everyone,

Yes, we are currently working with a pre-release build, which I have been sending many of my screenshots for the last few days from. I am trying to identify any possible visual artefacts that were missed by the dev team (there are a few), so that hopefully they can be resolved before the release next week.
At the moment there is no documentation regarding themes as it is something which we do not offer, but it is coming in build 357.0 which should hopefully release sometime next week.

Here are a few choice screenshots to show off how the new Themes appear
"black" (yes, with an option to respect the current system theme set in windows):
image.png
image1.png
"Dark Gray"
image2.png
image3.png
Even the default "white" theme is seeing some love, with more clear tabs and new scrollbars, as well as larger title bars for panes, and a more compact pane display (gone are the days of loosing 8 pixels of space from the thick yellow border around the application window).
image4.png
image5.png
Now, do note that this is a work in progress, pre-release build I am testing, many issues that you can see in my screenshots (like how the "typewriter" tool is almost impossible to see), the Dev team is aware of already and are working on improvements for, we may also be seeing a new icon set for the darker themes in a following build to fix these.

Due to these issues, and the very real chance that they will not all be resolved in time, the "respect system color" function will likely not be enabled by default with the 357 release. As such, we will likely remain in the "white" theme by default, until you manually change to the new Dark theme.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Oh, and I almost forgot, PDF-Tools has also seen the dark theme treatment:
image.png
Meanwhile the file explorer "preview handler" is still untouched, but will likely see some love in a future release.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Ovg »

Hi Daniel!

:thumbsup:
It's impossible to lead us astray for we don't care even to choose the way.
PDF-XChange PRO, 10.1.1 (Build 381) / W7 SP1 x64
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Willy Van Nuffel »

Also much appreciated and thanks from my side for the additional information.

I still have a few questions:

1) Will it become possible (I guess in later releases) to assemble and save customized themes of your own, instead of modifying existing themes?

2) The "Reset to Defaults"-button seems to have disappeared. How to reset the default themes (individually)?

Kind regards.

Willy
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, Willy Van Nuffel

At the moment, we still do not have the ability to save your own custom themes, but it may be considered in the future. For the moment, if you have customized the UI, then the "theme" bar will display the text "custom":
image.png
And, as is fairly common among other apps that offer multiple themes, selecting any of the default themes will "reset to defaults" within that theme, so the button has lost its purpose and was removed.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Willy Van Nuffel »

Thanks once again for the information.

For now, I only hope that the "Custom"-theme will be saved and preserved, even after one of the default themes will have been selected again.

Regards.

Willy
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello Willy Van Nuffel,

No the "Custom" theme does get reset if you apply one of the predefined ones, but I will check with our devs if there are plans for allowing a 'permanent' custom theme that you can store and reuse later.

Kind regards,
Stefan
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Willy Van Nuffel »

Thanks Stefan.


I suppose that having one custom theme, permanently available, will be sufficient for most of us.

In the new version (9.2.357.0) it is almost like that, for as long as we do not revert to one of the default themes.
If the "Custom" theme could be saved as an additional theme, it would even be better.

Kind regards.


Willy

Congratulations with the new version and thanks to the whole team for the splendid support and work you all are delivering every day.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Paul - Tracker Supp »

Hi Willy,

from the horses mouth:
yes we have in our plans to allow to store many custom themes. Hope it will be added in the next build..
:D
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Impress wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 11:41 pm PDF-XChange Editor is very customizable.

My favorite customization is setting it to display PDFs using a dark background with light text. This really helps my eyes.
I've been doing this too by overriding the document colors in Accessibility Options and added a toolbar button to toggle it easily, but for many documents I have to fiddle with the Line Art options for them to display properly. I would like there to be to an official dark mode filter that inverts colors similar to the Dark Reader browser extension.

I would also suggest adding a Dark Mode or Override Documents Color toolbar button by default, for people new to PDFX.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Paul - Tracker Supp »

Hi Jimmy,

thanks for the added suggestions. It is always a job to balance reasonable defaults and features with usability and clutter. Myself, I feel that System defaults would be a good choice for a default theme.

Your suggestions are appreciated.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Paul - Tracker Supp wrote: Sun Oct 31, 2021 6:16 pm thanks for the added suggestions. It is always a job to balance reasonable defaults and features with usability and clutter. Myself, I feel that System defaults would be a good choice for a default theme.
There might be some misunderstanding.

I was referring to the PDF content itself, not the application's UI theme. To get the PDF content dark, we currently have to use Override Document Colors in the Accessibility Options, and fiddle with the line art options to get them to look right.
What I suggest is an official and reliable solution for this, that's easily discoverable for new users.

Also, while we're on the subject of UI theming, I would like there to be an option to still have control over UI highlight color, Page View Background color & style/pattern in light mode, while keeping the default Page View Background color from the Allow Dark Mode from system, dark and unaffected, when it automatically switches modes. So what I'm asking here, is to let us have separate control over light and dark theme style/colors, while still allowing automatic switching based on system theme.
Last edited by JimmyD on Tue Nov 02, 2021 9:19 am, edited 6 times in total.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Paul - Tracker Supp »

hi Jimmy,

I clearly did misunderstand. Sorry about that. I've passed your comments on to the devs for consideration. We'll have to see what comes from that.

cheers
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Vasyl-Tracker Dev Team »

Hi Jimmy.
I've been doing this too by overriding the document colors in Accessibility Options and added a toolbar button to toggle it easily, but for many documents I have to fiddle with the Line Art options for them to display properly. I would like there to be to an official dark mode filter that inverts colors similar to the Dark Reader browser extension.

I would also suggest adding a Dark Mode or Override Documents Color toolbar button by default, for people new to PDFX.
Thanks for the suggestions. We will create a Feature Request to add the option to 'invert' the pages content too. Note: it may not be a simple inversion, but something more complex, I guess.
Also second feature-request - is to have simple buttons toolbar/menu to easily enable/disable the dark mode in UI.

Cheers.
Vasyl Yaremyn
Tracker Software Products
Project Developer

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Vasyl-Tracker Dev Team wrote: Mon Nov 01, 2021 8:30 pm Hi Jimmy.
I've been doing this too by overriding the document colors in Accessibility Options and added a toolbar button to toggle it easily, but for many documents I have to fiddle with the Line Art options for them to display properly. I would like there to be to an official dark mode filter that inverts colors similar to the Dark Reader browser extension.

I would also suggest adding a Dark Mode or Override Documents Color toolbar button by default, for people new to PDFX.
Thanks for the suggestions. We will create a Feature Request to add the option to 'invert' the pages content too. Note: it may not be a simple inversion, but something more complex, I guess.
Also second feature-request - is to have simple buttons toolbar/menu to easily enable/disable the dark mode in UI.

Cheers.
Many thanks for considering this feature.

Btw, I also had another feature request regarding separate UI theme customization, while still allowing automatic switching based on system theme.

https://forum.pdf-xchange.com/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=37320&p=154642#p154642
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello JimmyD,

It seems like the link in your previous post is to this same topic. Can you please check if this is the right one? Or maybe one of my colleagues merged the two topics in one?

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Tracker Supp-Stefan wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 10:09 am It seems like the link in your previous post is to this same topic. Can you please check if this is the right one? Or maybe one of my colleagues merged the two topics in one?
One question in that link is about the dark mode of the PDF content, which I think got split into 2 feature requests. Dark mode for PDF content, and a default button to toggle it.

The other question in that link is about dark mode customization of the PDFX UI itself, which I think hasn't been forwarded to the dev team yet.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, JimmyD

You are meaning this paragraph, yes?
JimmyD wrote: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:51 am Also, while we're on the subject of UI theming, I would like there to be an option to still have control over UI highlight color, Page View Background color & style/pattern in light mode, while keeping the default Page View Background color from the Allow Dark Mode from system, dark and unaffected, when it automatically switches modes. So what I'm asking here, is to let us have separate control over light and dark theme style/colors, while still allowing automatic switching based on system theme.
Sorry that we missed it, At the moment, like was mentioned in some earlier questions, no this is not available or planned, changing the UI mode to another preset is at the moment intended to revert to the defaults for that UI mode. The level of customization we offer currently is already far beyond what most applications that present a Dark theme (and switching based on the system UI theme) would even consider offering.
I will be sure that the Dev team reviews this as a possible option for the future, but I cannot promise implementation at this time. My recommendation at the moment is to select one and customize that.

As an aside, I will admit to being quite confused by the prospect of your system UI theme switching from dark to light frequently enough for this ever to be a concern. My understanding was that theme is intended to be a "one off, pick your preference" switch, and not something that changes on an hourly basis, you yourself mentioned liking a dark theme because it is easier on your eyes, which is why I myself prefer them as well. If you don't mind me asking, why then would you intentionally switch back to a light theme in any situation?

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 3:25 pm Hello, JimmyD

You are meaning this paragraph, yes?
JimmyD wrote: Mon Nov 01, 2021 7:51 am Also, while we're on the subject of UI theming, I would like there to be an option to still have control over UI highlight color, Page View Background color & style/pattern in light mode, while keeping the default Page View Background color from the Allow Dark Mode from system, dark and unaffected, when it automatically switches modes. So what I'm asking here, is to let us have separate control over light and dark theme style/colors, while still allowing automatic switching based on system theme.
Yes that's the paragraph I meant.
TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 3:25 pm As an aside, I will admit to being quite confused by the prospect of your system UI theme switching from dark to light frequently enough for this ever to be a concern. My understanding was that theme is intended to be a "one off, pick your preference" switch, and not something that changes on an hourly basis, you yourself mentioned liking a dark theme because it is easier on your eyes, which is why I myself prefer them as well. If you don't mind me asking, why then would you intentionally switch back to a light theme in any situation?
I'm switching between a light and dark Windows theme on an automated schedule, with the Auto Dark Mode tool, based on sunrise and sunset. This way I only get bright light during the day, and reduce light exposure during the evening and night, resulting in better sleep.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, JimmyD

Thank you for the input, I was unaware that windows offers an option to change the theme on a schedule, I personally would not use it, but I suppose that is an irrelevant point in this case. Ill make a note of this so that the Dev team can take a close look at that option while working on it.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 5:56 pm Thank you for the input, I was unaware that windows offers an option to change the theme on a schedule, I personally would not use it, but I suppose that is an irrelevant point in this case. Ill make a note of this so that the Dev team can take a close look at that option while working on it.
I use a 3rd-party Auto Dark Mode tool, since Windows doesn't offer this scheduling as an official feature yet, but it's very likely that it will in the not too distant feature, as this is a highly requested feature since and all the other major operating systems have this feature now.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, JimmyD

I see, well in that case I do expect that this particular facet of you requests may be rejected for the time being as a bit too specific and obscure to be useful to the vast majority of our users. If we see more demand for it or windows starts officially offering a feature to allow this, then that may change, but until then, I would not get your hopes up.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

I understand, but the thing is that PDFX already almost works as I described.
It already allows customizing the "Default (uses system colors)" theme, but the only culprit is that when you do, it also affects the dark mode of that theme, which I suspect is unintended.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, JimmyD

I am afraid that I do not follow. Making a change to any theme enables a temporary "custom" theme, so doing that should disable the "use system theme" function entirely. Are you saying that on your end this is not the case?

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 7:14 pm I am afraid that I do not follow. Making a change to any theme enables a temporary "custom" theme, so doing that should disable the "use system theme" function entirely. Are you saying that on your end this is not the case?
Exactly, this is not the case. It still switches based on system theme if you had "Dark Mode From System" selected, prior to making a chance, even though it now shows as Custom.
That said, this is still better than nothing (so please don't take this away), since it allows changing the orange highlight color to gray or blue and disable the Overlay Shadows of the "Page View Background" which still doesn't look out of place in both modes.
But once I change the color and style of the "Page View Background" to a very light gray and solid, which I prefer during the day, this will obviously ruin the dark mode.
Last edited by JimmyD on Wed Nov 03, 2021 10:10 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, JimmyD

I see... In that case, we will see what we can do, but as before, I cannot make any promises at the moment.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Thanks, it's highly appreciated.
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PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Dimitar - Tracker Supp »

:)
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Impress »

JimmyD wrote: Sun Oct 31, 2021 10:42 am
Impress wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 11:41 pm PDF-XChange Editor is very customizable.

My favorite customization is setting it to display PDFs using a dark background with light text. This really helps my eyes.
I've been doing this too by overriding the document colors in Accessibility Options and added a toolbar button to toggle it easily, but for many documents I have to fiddle with the Line Art options for them to display properly. I would like there to be to an official dark mode filter that inverts colors similar to the Dark Reader browser extension.

I would also suggest adding a Dark Mode or Override Documents Color toolbar button by default, for people new to PDFX.
Jimmy, that's really clever to add a toolbar button to toggle the document colors.

Would you mind sharing the steps you took to accomplish this? It will save me 20 minutes reinventing the wheel! :D
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Impress »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Tue Nov 02, 2021 9:14 pm Hello, JimmyD

I see... In that case, we will see what we can do, but as before, I cannot make any promises at the moment.

Kind regards,
I'm still catching up on all the activity on this thread (don't have enough free time right now), but I wanted to make sure the following is documented and that the devs are aware:

The typewriter toolbar button is almost invisible when using a dark toolbar background color.

The Rectangle Tool toolbar button is almost invisible when using a dark toolbar background color if the color of the rectangle is a dark color (navy blue, dark gray, black, et al.).

The Redo and Undo buttons are hard to see when using a dark toolbar background color.

Also, maybe I just have something configured wrong (or PDF-XChange Editor is using some of the system colors, but ignoring others), but all my tooltips within PDF-XChange Editor are black text on dark green, which makes them nearly impossible to discern.

I hope these issues can be fixed! Thanks! :)
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, Impress

Yes, these are issues we are aware of, The dev team is looking into a new icon set to be substituted in while the dark theme is in use to make all of these items "pop" like they do in the light theme.

Regarding your issue with tooltips, I do not believe we pull any of that from the system theme, but if you can send a screenshot of what you see, and a screenshot of your "preferences > customize UI" window, we can take a look and see what could cause this.

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by David.P »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Wed Nov 24, 2021 5:37 pm The dev team is looking into a new icon set
Image

Please Tracker Team, if you are working on a new icon set: please do not follow the massively expiring fashion of years ago with flat, or possibly even monochrome icons!

Image

Please. Otherwise I would have to take early retirement immediately in order to avoid having to use PDF-XChange Editor ever again!
Image

This is what Microsoft's latest icons from the Office 365 beta look like, in all four different styles, namely "colorful", "white", "dark gray" and "black":

Image

While these Microsoft icons are not too shabby, and while Microsoft fortunately at least doesn't follow the abysmal trend for monochrome icons anymore (unfortunately, the icons are still flat, but that fashion will pass as well, as can be seen from Microsoft's very own research team videos: vimeo.com/573224898)

...so while these Microsoft icons are not as bad as they could be, your current icon set is already much better, and particularly doesn't look dated at all!

So please, revise your icon set very cautiously, and please under no circumstances reduce the color depth, or optical depth for that matter, but rather increase both the latter and the former if anything – because more color and more depth is going to be the trend of the future.

A short reminder of the recent thread about the user interface fits in here as well:
forum.tracker-software.com/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=37479&p=154149#:~:text=Further,like!

Don't worry, my announced further screenshots on this topic are on their way.

Kind regards
David
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

Hello, David.P

Youve taken what I said a bit out of context, first off, we are only lookin into the possibility, this is not a promise that will be the end result. Yes we are aware of how, surprisingly passionate, some people can be regarding these items.
Second, you missed a key aspect of that statement:
TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Wed Nov 24, 2021 5:37 pm The dev team is looking into a new icon set to be substituted in while the dark theme is in use
We are not currently looking at replacing all icons, but looking at viable substitutes for the very specific problematic icons, which Impress mentioned, exclusively while in the dark theme.

Kind regards,
Dan McIntyre - Support Technician
Tracker Software Products (Canada) LTD

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by David.P »

TrackerSupp-Daniel wrote: Wed Nov 24, 2021 7:24 pmyou missed a key aspect of that statement
I know Daniel, I was being a bit overly dramatic, however intentionally so :)
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PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Paul - Tracker Supp »

:)
Best regards

Paul O'Rorke
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http://www.tracker-software.com
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by JimmyD »

Impress wrote: Wed Nov 24, 2021 3:08 am
JimmyD wrote: Sun Oct 31, 2021 10:42 am
Impress wrote: Fri Sep 03, 2021 11:41 pm PDF-XChange Editor is very customizable.

My favorite customization is setting it to display PDFs using a dark background with light text. This really helps my eyes.
I've been doing this too by overriding the document colors in Accessibility Options and added a toolbar button to toggle it easily, but for many documents I have to fiddle with the Line Art options for them to display properly. I would like there to be to an official dark mode filter that inverts colors similar to the Dark Reader browser extension.

I would also suggest adding a Dark Mode or Override Documents Color toolbar button by default, for people new to PDFX.
Jimmy, that's really clever to add a toolbar button to toggle the document colors.

Would you mind sharing the steps you took to accomplish this? It will save me 20 minutes reinventing the wheel! :D
In the "Customize Toolbars" dialog, select the "Commands" tab and search for "override", then drag the "Override Document Colors" command to a toolbar of your choice.
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello JimmyD,

Thanks for helping @Impress and I hope this colour mode would be usable to them as well!

Kind regards,
Stefan
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by David.P »

Hello all,

For completeness, I shall add the below link to the recent related thread with detailed screenshot comparisons of the latest changes in the user interface to the previous user interface.

https://forum.pdf-xchange.com/viewtopic.php?f=62&t=37810#p156030

Image

Thanks @all
David
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello David.P,

Thanks for this! We have brought your comments and remarks to the attention of our UI developers, so I am sure they are taking note!

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Stefan
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by David.P »

Thank you very much Stefan,
That is awesome.
Best regards,
David
:)
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PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by TrackerSupp-Daniel »

:)
Dan McIntyre - Support Technician
Tracker Software Products (Canada) LTD

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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Jensen Head »

A small suggestion to improve the visibility of icons with images of pages in a dark color theme:
now
now
suggested
suggested
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello Jensen Head,

That's quite a subtle change, and I had to quickly switch between the two images to be able to notice it.
I am afraid that icons redesign might be more complex than it looks, so while I will pass this suggestion - I can not promise that it would be implemented.

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Stefan
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Re: PDF-XChange Editor dark theme

Post by Tracker Supp-Stefan »

Hello Jensen Head,

Here's some further update from our devs:
For the future we are planning a redesign of our whole icon set to better support the light/dark themes. This would require a more complicated solution than what we have already - icons may change their appearance on the fly, depending on the background colour. That will be a complicated task though, so there is no simple and easy solution for the moment.



Kind regards,
Stefan
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