Colour schemes affect

the quality of your work!

Adok/Hugi

Writing in the text editor program called "Notepad", a program that has been included in Microsoft Windows since version 3.0, is a new experience for me. I'm accustomed to writing in a special DOS text editor, which is still the best program for my needs: it allows me to set text margins, align texts to the left, right or center, and justify paragraphs. But this program has a disadvantage - its predefined colour schemes simply suck. The colour scheme I use is the best that's offered. And yet it's not as friendly as the scheme of Notepad with the default Windows desktop setup. That's why I now use Notepad for writing and my beloved other program for editing.

You may ask why I don't simply set up a customized palette? I have no time for that. Whenever I start my text editor, I am in a hurry. Either am I forced to update the hugi compo website or edit articles because the announced releasedate of a new Hugi issue is getting close, or I feel the urge to write. And when I feel the urge to write, I have to write. I must not do anything else, just write. And if one day I feel like playing a bit with the colour scheme, I'll reproach myself for doing unnecessary stuff, as the colour scheme is only a private affair of mine; the time would be better spent doing something really productive that could also please other people, such as writing articles.

But maybe changing the colour scheme would indeed affect other people, too, because it would affect my mood and hence the style of the article. The pre-defined scheme I use now features a nasty black background. Black, that's a rather depressing colour. On the other hand, however, texts are more legible than on blue or green or yellow backgrounds, and that's what counts more, doesn't it?

And yet it could be better: with Windows' default colours, Notepad pleases my heart with black text on a white background. This is not only even more readable, but also a wonderfully optimistic combination.

You see, now I have the best combination, and I have not wasted my time by creating a custom colour scheme! This is what I call productivity.


Adok/Hugi - 12 Feb 2000