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Off topic: CAT Tools: Dark mode/dark theme desperately needed
Thread poster: Ken Ho
Ken Ho
Ken Ho  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 23:47
English to Chinese
+ ...
Jun 9, 2022

Dear All Colleagues ,

I understand that most of you use and rely on one or more CAT tools to boost your productivity, and some of them do provide sort of limited setting functions to customize some appearances. However, it is a pity that the user experience of all the tools is far from satisfactory in terms of eye protection, due to lack of a user-friendly dark mode/dark theme.

Personally I find it very distracting when using them to translate, especially after I got us... See more
Dear All Colleagues ,

I understand that most of you use and rely on one or more CAT tools to boost your productivity, and some of them do provide sort of limited setting functions to customize some appearances. However, it is a pity that the user experience of all the tools is far from satisfactory in terms of eye protection, due to lack of a user-friendly dark mode/dark theme.

Personally I find it very distracting when using them to translate, especially after I got used to the dark mode of some programming IDEs, such as VS Code (https://code.visualstudio.com/), which I use frequently to write markdown files.

Hence, I would like to call for actions from all of you to urge/push all main stream CAT tool providers as well as Proz.com to provide a more user-friendly dark mode/dark theme in their desktop clients and web versions.

Thank you very much. ▲ Collapse


Jan Truper
MOHAMMAD ALRAI
 
Jan Truper
Jan Truper  Identity Verified
Germany
Local time: 16:47
English to German
... Jun 9, 2022

I absolutely agree and find it baffling that these programs do not offer this option.


I use a workaround for memoQ ***on a Mac via Parallels***:

Windows -> Magnifier tool -> enable color inversion
then set the colors in memoQ to your liking (inverted colors mean that white will turn black and pink will turn green, for example)

This works only in this specific setup, because memoQ is the only Windows program I use -- all other programs are handl... See more
I absolutely agree and find it baffling that these programs do not offer this option.


I use a workaround for memoQ ***on a Mac via Parallels***:

Windows -> Magnifier tool -> enable color inversion
then set the colors in memoQ to your liking (inverted colors mean that white will turn black and pink will turn green, for example)

This works only in this specific setup, because memoQ is the only Windows program I use -- all other programs are handled by the MacOS and are therefore not color-inverted. ▲ Collapse
 
WolfgangS
WolfgangS
France
Local time: 16:47
Member (2007)
English to German
+ ...
Cafetran Jun 9, 2022

Ken Ho wrote:

Dear All Colleagues ,

I understand that most of you use and rely on one or more CAT tools to boost your productivity, and some of them do provide sort of limited setting functions to customize some appearances. However, it is a pity that the user experience of all the tools is far from satisfactory in terms of eye protection, due to lack of a user-friendly dark mode/dark theme.

Personally I find it very distracting when using them to translate, especially after I got used to the dark mode of some programming IDEs, such as VS Code (https://code.visualstudio.com/), which I use frequently to write markdown files.

Hence, I would like to call for actions from all of you to urge/push all main stream CAT tool providers as well as Proz.com to provide a more user-friendly dark mode/dark theme in their desktop clients and web versions.

Thank you very much.


Take a look at Cafetran, you can configure the background/fonts/segments with different colour schemes.

[Edited at 2022-06-09 06:27 GMT]

Tom in London
Georgi Kovachev
Ken Ho
 
Samuel Murray
Samuel Murray  Identity Verified
Netherlands
Local time: 16:47
Member (2006)
English to Afrikaans
+ ...
Easy Invert Jun 9, 2022

There is a program called Easy Invert that can do something like this:
https://www.wintools.info/index.php/easy-invert
(I haven't tried it because of the warnings at the time of installation, but perhaps someone has the courage.)

Douglas Brum
 
Ken Ho
Ken Ho  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 23:47
English to Chinese
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Not easy Jun 10, 2022

It's not easy to handle the magnifier tool well during translating.

Jan Truper wrote:

I absolutely agree and find it baffling that these programs do not offer this option.


I use a workaround for memoQ ***on a Mac via Parallels***:

Windows -> Magnifier tool -> enable color inversion
then set the colors in memoQ to your liking (inverted colors mean that white will turn black and pink will turn green, for example)

This works only in this specific setup, because memoQ is the only Windows program I use -- all other programs are handled by the MacOS and are therefore not color-inverted.
 
Ken Ho
Ken Ho  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 23:47
English to Chinese
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Nice 3rd party tool Jun 10, 2022

This will absolutely serve my needs.

Samuel Murray wrote:

There is a program called Easy Invert that can do something like this:
https://www.wintools.info/index.php/easy-invert
(I haven't tried it because of the warnings at the time of installation, but perhaps someone has the courage.)


 
Ken Ho
Ken Ho  Identity Verified
China
Local time: 23:47
English to Chinese
+ ...
TOPIC STARTER
Cafetran Jun 10, 2022

This is the one with dark theme and full color scheme customization function.
Great to know this.

Wolfgang wrote:
Take a look at Cafetran, you can configure the background/fonts/segments with different colour schemes.

[Edited at 2022-06-09 06:27 GMT]


[Edited at 2022-06-10 23:41 GMT]

Tom in London
 
Adieu
Adieu  Identity Verified
Ukrainian to English
+ ...
There are a lot of key missing visual features in modern CAT tools Jun 11, 2022

Dark mode is one. I'd prefer full black background for AMOLED screens.

Another feature I'd kill to get on MemoQ: to color code TM matches to highlight your own entries to set them apart from the "geniuses" you're forced to work with

MOHAMMAD ALRAI
 
Douglas Brum
Douglas Brum
Brazil
Local time: 12:47
English to Portuguese
Windows Color Filters May 7, 2024

Samuel Murray wrote:

There is a program called Easy Invert that can do something like this:
https://www.wintools.info/index.php/easy-invert
(I haven't tried it because of the warnings at the time of installation, but perhaps someone has the courage.)


You can achieve the same results using Windows (10 or higher) color filters:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/use-color-filters-in-windows-43893e44-b8b3-2e27-1a29-b0c15ef0e5ce

And you can easily turn it on or off using the shortcut: Win+Ctrl+c

Reference: https://www.reddit.com/r/TranslationStudies/comments/zrpk36/dark_theme_in_cat_tools/?rdt=56605
 


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CAT Tools: Dark mode/dark theme desperately needed






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