Introducing Dark Mode!
 

It's finally here! To activate Dark Mode, just go into the navigation menu while logged in and click "Dark Mode". This function is usable on both desktop and mobile.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...d2bf328518.png

Thankyouthankyouthankyou for this :)

Not to sound ungrateful, but I do have a few notes :p

1. In desktop mode, on the usercp page https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/usercp.php

The titles of the forums are low contrast compared to the background and hard to read. Can they be made the same color as the thread title on the right column? Bonus points if they can make forums with unread posts stand out more than forums with no new posts. Basically it's the dark mode equivalent of the issue I reported here (contrast the screenshots in post 1 and 15): https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/tech...st-2023-a.html

Otherwise the only cue in the screenshot below is that the SkyTeam forum (no new posts) has an outlined folder whereas the other 3 which have new unread posts have a solid folder. Which is better than nothing, but if it was more obvious it would be even better :)

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c6729393ec.png

2. And in mobile mode, a similar request -- the only cue as to which thread has unread posts is the red dot on the speech bubble vs. no red dot. IMO it would be better to use not only the red dot but also the background (which currently just strictly alternates) to help highlight which threads have unread posts. This is on https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/subs...ion&folder=all but also applies to e.g. the list of threads in a single forum.

https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c9a83ee837.png

3. Something I just noticed while composing this reply, in the toolbar at the top of the full editor interface, the upload photo button is gone! Ok it's actually still there, to the right of the paperclip :D and it shows up (barely) when you hover over it and it gets lightly highlighted, but maybe that icon could be touched up a bit for dark mode to help it show up better.

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...87554cf56e.png

This is 90% really, really fantastic. Thank you!

The biggest issue is on some threads where text is hard to read or doesn't appear at all. Example from https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/avis-preferred-budget-fastbreak/2107208-2023-upgrades-17.html:

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...ff60f3b1c7.jpg

One more thing I just noticed, in the Reply to Thread section (both Quick Reply and the full version):

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c4337b8e51.jpg

-J.

The problem here is that those posts explicitly use the COLOR tag to force black text. This may not be intentional, it may have been simply that they copied and pasted text that happened to have that attribute. But in any case that's not the fault of dark mode.

Jinx :p

That's true -- it's really the dark gray text which is an issue. Perhaps this color could be removed from the palette or replaced with something else.

Slightly off topic: I wouldn't object to reducing the palette to just a few colors (default, black, white, red, blue, green). Some people on the forum tend to, well, take full advantage of the color options which can on occasion make it very difficult to read their posts (someone posted in yellow once, for instance, which is tough to distinguish against a white background). Now that we have two background options (light and dark modes), it will only get worse.

Example from https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/comm...29-2023-a.html with two colors being used (I swear this is not a shameless plug ;)). These look fine against a white background, but in dark mode are nearly unreadable. (Apologies to the OP for making an example of this.)

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...51e2416ea2.jpg


-J.

I actually thought they fixed the grey text issue before rollouts, because I specifically asked them to. Sorry about that, guys

I like dark mode when I'm on my phone, where I use the mobile version, and light mode on my desktop. However, when I switched to dark mode on my phone, so did my computer.

It's not the end of the world having to toggle between the two, however, it would be nice if there were separate dark mode toggles for mobile and desktop.

OK, I'll bite. What is the point of dark mode?

It's easier on the eyes. The higher contrast may also benefit some people. Most think it is just a gimmick but there are real accessibility-related benefits to having a dark mode option.

-J.

Try living with the consequences of an eye condition. I am unable to sustain looking at at bright screens, and bright stuff in general. Fortunately I didn't need to wait for IB to do their dark mode as you can get the browser to do the inversion, which has the bonus that it does everything, all sites.

It took me a moment to find the "edit" button for wikiposts. It is now an icon instead of a text button. I am not sure if this was intentional.

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...4346f898f2.jpg

I've also found the hex code for the dark grey that matches the background color: 333333

-J.

Thank You!

I concur that the post listings are hard to decipher read vs. unread in dark mode as it stands now.

Could the dark mode just be a dark version of the default theme? Currently, it has its own fonts etc. and is actually quite different from the light mode.

How do you like browser inversion vs the dark mode theme?

Typically this is how derivative themes are created, but it only works well when a lot of the graphics are the same. The second you need a bunch of custom graphics, it makes more sense to 'copy and modify' a theme versus making a derivative.

I do the same on Chrome
In Chrome, type chrome://flags into the address bar and hit Enter.

• This will open the Experiments page. Tap in the Search flags box and type "dark".
• You'll see an option labeled Auto Dark Mode for Web Contents. Enable it.
• Tap Relaunch to restart the browser with the new dark mode applied.

Thanks.

Chrome's experimental native Dark Mode looks much better than the Dark Mode option in the mobile version of FlyerTalk and I can tell which of my subscribed forums have new posts, only those with new posts are listed in bold print as opposed to all the forums.

After looking at this for a few days it seems this is a Beta mode version and the finished product.
By that I mean this center section is a shade of gray, with the borders black. The whole page should be black like every other forum's dark mode and even Twitter/X and Reddit have true dark modes.

The white lettering stands out much better against black., So still a ways to go.

There are too many different segments and areas on each page to do all black. I assure you that would look like garbage on this site.

Apologies for the delay. Due to an eye condition I use dark mode and other accessibility tools all the time, it's not a nice to have.

On mobile devices I use the browser with the dark mode rendering flag as IBJoel described, along with a the OS being in dark mode.

The browser being set to dark mode rendering on the FT mobile site is perfect, it works really really well, and nothing "disappears" that I notice. Using the dark mode rendering on many other sites some web components often become difficult to see on the page, radio buttons and toggle switches are often the worst offenders.

On a Windows desktop I don't use the browser dark mode rendering or any specific app and it's dark mode, and instead I use the accessibility tools and switch Windows into high contrast mode (LeftShift + Alt + PrtScn, on a laptop your PrtScn might also need you to press Fn). This does everything in one go, and is a very consistent experience. Colours get stripped and changed but for me it works nicely, there are still some things that are awkward, radio buttons and toggles are again the baddies.

Still having issues with grey text being unreadable in dark mode on PC using Chrome. Example from here: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/35650635-post418.html

https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...ddcfbefa43.jpg

-J.

I am a long-time and vocal critic of various technical failings (IMO) of the FT/IB system, but if the dark mode background is #333333, and someone writes a post that explicitly uses the tag "color=#333333" as the color of their text (you can see it if you click Quote on that message and then the Source button in the editor), I am not sure what you want the software to do :confused:

Granted, one proposal that seems reasonable at first, might be to automatically pick a different color when the color tag is the same as the background, sometimes people do it deliberately -- e.g. presuming "light mode" sometimes people will ask a trivia or secret question kind of thing and use the color tag to make the text white so it doesn't appear initially but shows up when you highlight it. From a usability standpoint it seems like a bad idea for software to change a color setting that a user explicitly specified -- you would get complaints the other way.

As I suggested upthread, perhaps the powers-that-be would consider changing (or reducing) the color palette for post text. Nobody needs to be writing in that specific color (or yellow, or neon green, etc.). I'd like to think that most of us are adults here and won't lose too many users if we reduced the colors available.

-J.

Fair enough, if they removed gray (and white) from the dropdown that would cut down on some of it; they'd also have to remove the "color" tag so that you can't use it in source, or else have to parse out the colors and filter a range of hex codes; and they'd also have to modify how copy and paste works since pasting text that had had text styling like bold/italic/underline plus colors, preserves those attributes unless you right click and paste as plain text.

People manually typing in color codes can probably be dismissed as so rare (plus if you do it on purpose then you get what you deserve) but the pasting issue happens a lot when people copy T&C or promo language from websites etc. (and then the rest of what they type matches the pasted color)

No objection from me anyway :)

BTW even black text is difficult (for my aging eyes anyway) to make out against the dark background, e.g.:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/35654074-post315.html

Do we remove black from the dropdown palette too?

So it's not a bad idea, but there is some devil in the details...

Black is still easier to read than the matching grey. I still stand by my suggestion -- reduce the palette to black, white, and 4-6 other colors (red, blue, green, ...maybe orange, yellow, violet, for example), along with the automatic option. The current selection has 24 choices. Having 6 or 8 in total would keep the selection window rectangular.

I'm only harping on this because I saw several posts today that were in the #333333 gray.

-J.

I think the biggest problem with reducing the color palette for posts is that is a 'hard function' in vbulletin, so would probably be a long time of hand modifying code--ie, not happening. The other option of completely removing color for a post text option is more easily possible, but I don't remember exactly what that does to existing posts (I think nothing, but been a while since I've looked at these options inside my admincp).

Not great solutions either way. I'm all for requiring people to cut and paste to notepad first to get rid of colors and formatting before pasting into a post. :D

I apologize if this was posted previously - but dark mode when I read FT on my phone (android) had a tendency to crash Chrome and various other apps; not always, but frequently. Which never happened pre-dark mode. No issues on my actual computer; and my eyes are forever grateful for dark mode. (as something I have asked for/complained about multiple times)

Dark mode on PC is still not working correctly, text changes to black on black within post very often, more than 20% of the posts are not readable, it is a pain. Is there any plan to get it to work on the basic ?
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...350ab5032f.png
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...507338f8a7.png

Are you referring to post #4 in this thread? https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/brit...l#post35989241

That is not directly the fault of dark mode -- the poster has explicitly written that section of the post in dark grey text, whether wittingly or unwittingly -- I am guessing they copy and pasted goldwannabe's name from a context where it had the color associated with it in the web page code; when you paste such text it retains the color coding unless you right click => paste as plain text.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...c71aba0da5.png

333333 is a dark grey, so everything inside that "color" tag appears in that color which is why it is hard to read in dark mode.

It's possible IB could do something to automatically treat all pasted text as "paste as plain text" which would help a lot (as I suspect many FTers may be unaware there is a dark mode and that there is an issue) but it wouldn't prevent a situation where someone explicitly chose black foreground text from the editor menu and typed in that color, for example.

Yes a plain text copy mode by default would work. Bottom line is that I use plenty of forums with dark mode and only one has a problem persistent after several months. So any argument that IB can do nothing does not pass the smell test

While I would support that, playing devil's advocate, it's not quite as trivial as it sounds -- sometimes users may _want_ to preserve formatting when pasting text, e.g. if it contains italics, bold, bullet points, ... forcing paste-as-plain-text precludes those use cases. I'm personally ok with making that tradeoff :) but it's a consideration.

I am curious, do the other forums actively remove color tags if a user explicitly chooses one as the foreground color for a post? That seems pretty wrong too from a UX perspective (what if a user wants to highlight a particular section in red, for example).

Or do they only remove color tags within some "distance" of black or white in RGB color space? That seems non-trivial too.

Not sure how they handle it. They do have simpler interfaces though, and also do not seem to be so heavy reliant on HTML in their editor.

https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...fe136a3e93.png

This post is a good example where I have a hard time that it should still happen 3 months after the roll out of the feature. The color changes mid word, there is no way this is a conscious choice by the OP (because there are plenty of posts like this all around the forum by lots of different users), there is no clear change of fonts or tag uses (no quote, no bold, no username references). So IB staff, could we please get some sort of status and estimate to make Dark mode a proper usable feature ?

You'd be surprised by user behaviors, especially RE: sloppy cut/paste. But nonetheless I've asked an automotive forum if they still have issues with this. This particular auto site was the first to roll out dark mode in the company, so they may have some solid insight.

Is there a way to switch back to light mode? Once I switched to Dark Mode I no longer see a button I can press to switch back.

Thank you for sharing your experience and solutions. Good to know the native windows these for accessibility does a good job across the board. I don't need any help looking at stuff right now, but always nice to know what works and works well. :)

Unfortunately, this is more an OS thing than it is a vb thing as the posting box is just accepting what is being pasted vs parsing it. Disabling all bbcode across the entire forum might solve that issue, but will break more stuff than it fixes for sure.

Definitely a great idea as some of them are dark by default too so they'll have more experience with dealing with pasted data with formatting. Thank you for staying active in this thread--I know visiting a thread just to get pounded on can't be a fun job.

I actually can't find a button to switch to dark mode. I don't know if this will fix it, but maybe using the style chooser to change the theme will work. Another thing that might work better is to change an option in your user control panel for 'classic mode homepage' and see if that takes it out of dark mode as that's what I'm using and I don't even see the option for dark mode.

It's under the "hamburger" menu (the three horizontal lines), same place as where one turns on dark mode.

In mobile skin the link to switch is at the bottom of the menu. In desktop it's in the lower right.

Ah, I've never used that before--yep right there. Thank you!