Protesilaos Stavrou

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Modus themes 1.7.0 for GNU Emacs

I just released version 1.7.0 of the Modus themes. The release notes are reproduced below. For any questions pertaining to this publication, feel welcome to contact me.

I will now prepare the patch for the master branch on emacs.git (currently this corresponds to Emacs version 29). The modus-themes package in GNU ELPA fetches its contents from emacs.git, so expect an update to trickle down shortly after my patch is merged.

Modus themes version 1.7.0

By Protesilaos Stavrou info@protesilaos.com on 2021-11-18

The present entry records the changes made to the project since the release of version 1.6.0 on 2021-09-29. There have been more than 60 commits since then.

Every modification pertaining to colour combinations referenced herein is 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). Edits also account for colour-coding that is optimised for the needs of users with red-green colour deficiency (deuteranopia).

To access the URL of the manual visit this web page: https://protesilaos.com/emacs/modus-themes. Or read it from Emacs by evaluating this form:

(info "(modus-themes) Top")

The themes are built into Emacs version 28 (next stable release), and are available on GNU ELPA as well as other archives. This release is the first one that is included with Emacs 29, or else the master branch in emacs.git.

Customisation options

  • The modus-themes-no-mixed-fonts has been deprecated and replaced by the modus-themes-mixed-fonts. This is a breaking change for users who want to use “mixed fonts”: they must set the new variable to non-nil.

    As the name implies, the new variable changes the meaning of the feature to make it opt-in by default. This is consistent with the principle of least surprise, as users may not know why some fonts look different than others in certain cases.

    Thanks to Christian Tietze for clarifying the doc string of this new user option in merge request 51: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/merge_requests/51.

    For context, “mixed fonts” refers to a design where spacing-sensitive constructs, such as code blocks and Org tables, inherit from the fixed-pitch face to remain monospaced (and properly aligned) at all times. Depending on the user’s configurations, the fixed-pitch face may not use the typeface that the user expects.

    The manual provides information on how to set the desired fonts by editing the default, fixed-pitch, and variable-pitch faces.

  • The new modus-themes-mode-line-padding can be used to control the apparent padding of the mode line when the user option modus-themes-mode-line includes the padded property. The padding must be a positive integer (otherwise the code would be needlessly complex to guard against values that make the mode line look awkward, like anything lower than -3 or maybe even -2).

    Thanks to Guilherme Semente and Manuel Uberti for the feedback in issue 245: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/245.

    Note that the out-of-the-box style of the themes has a padding of 1 (technically a :line-width of 1 for the :box attribute), whereas the default style of Emacs has it at -1. This is a design choice to avoid an overlap between the outer boundaries of a font’s glyphs and the borders of the mode line, when using certain common typefaces at various point sizes. Such an overlap can hinder readability.

    The manual contains a new Do-It-Yourself (DIY) section with detailed code samples on how to apply a negative value.

  • The new modus-themes-intense-markup option can be set to non-nil to make constructs such as inline code and verbatim text more colourful. This has a general utility, though its consideration was prompted by a phenomenon reported by Stefan Kangas in issue 238 where the overlay of the hl-line-face overrides the subtle background these constructs use and can thus make them virtually indistinguishable from ordinary text: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/238.

    Such is the standard behaviour of hl-line-mode and there is nothing a theme can (or rather “should”) do about it. Thanks to Stefan Kangas for the feedback.

  • The modus-themes-headings option can now accept and apply an exact font weight such as semibold or light. (The list of available weights is the value of the modus-themes--heading-weights internal variable.) This supersedes the now-deprecated no-bold property: no-bold is henceforth understood as the presence of a regular weight.

    Recall that this user option is an alist and can be used to target heading levels individually, which further reinforces the utility of this new property.

    Thanks to Christian Tietze for suggesting this idea in issue 248: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/248. And thanks to Daniel Mendler for refining its implementation in commit 54bfd62, which was sent as a patch file (yes, we accept those and I actually prefer them over a web app’s UI).

  • The modus-themes-org-agenda has seen improvements to its event key (this is an alist that has multiple keys). It now accepts a varied property which differentiates between (i) plain timestamp entries and (ii) entries that are generated from either the diary or a symbolic expression. The varied property combines with the other available properties to particularise their effects. Consult the doc string or the manual for the technicalities.

    Thanks to Gustavo Barros for the detailed commentary in issue 241: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/241.

  • The modus-themes-lang-checkers now accepts a faint property. This has the effect of toning down the colours in use. By default, the only colour is that of the underline, though more can be added by combining the properties accepted by this user option. Consult its doc string or the manual for further details.

    Thanks to Morgan Smith for suggesting the idea in issue 239: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/239.

Add support for new packages or face groups

Changes to existing faces or face groups

  • Added support for the new Org agenda faces that improve the contextuality of various views. We implemented those upstream for Org version 9.5 in close cooperation with Gustavo Barros. Thanks to Gustavo for the detailed feedback in issue 241: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/241. The thread about the patch upstream: https://list.orgmode.org/87lf7q7gpq.fsf@protesilaos.com/

  • Refined Org agenda date faces in the interest of consistency and in accordance with the aforementioned change. Thanks again to Gustavo Barros for the discussion in issue 241.

  • Applied the shadow face more consistently across all contexts where only a subtle foreground value is expected. This design choice makes it possible for users to manually edit the foreground colour of shadow to something even more subtle than the fg-alt palette variable we use, which maps to a gray colour (e.g. they could use “gray50”).

  • Implemented a subtle background colour to the widget-inactive face. This makes it easier to discern inactive buttons, checkboxes, and the like, in contexts such as the Customize User Interface. Thanks to Stefan Kangas for the feedback in issue 242: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/242.

  • Tweaked file-name-shadow to also use italics (inherit from the italic face) in order to be more easy to distinguish it from ordinary text in the minibuffer.

    Recall that the manual documents the meaning of inheriting from the bold and italic faces instead of hardcoding a bold weight and an italic slant, respectively. In short: users can change the weight to what they want (e.g. semibold) and/or use distinct font families.

  • Amplified the style of Version Control (VC) warnings and errors to let them draw more attention to themselves (because these indicators need to be acted upon).

  • Recoloured the custom-group-tag face to make it fit better in its context and be consistent with the rest of the themes’ established patterns.

  • Made marks for selection in Dired, Ibuffer, and related, conform with the modus-themes-success-deuteranopia option. This means that they use blue colours when the option is non-nil, instead of their default shades of green.

  • Adjusted the box width of key bindings for Emacs 28 or higher. They should no longer cause any alignment issues. This style is now used throughout the themes, including in transient views (e.g. Magit) which were the exception before. Thanks to Manuel Uberti and Kevin Fleming for the feedback in issue 232: https://gitlab.com/protesilaos/modus-themes/-/issues/232.

Miscellaneous

  • Wrote a brief description of every user option in the manual. Also covered its type, as in boolean, alist, et cetera.

  • Corrected the mode line border width for one combination of properties in the modus-themes-mode-line option. This should now have the same height as all others:

    (setq modus-themes-mode-line '(accented borderless))

  • Ensured that mode line attributes would not be set to nil, but kept at an unspecified value instead, where relevant. This avoids problems with [faulty] code that unconditionally depends on something that does not exist, as in the following while :box is nil:

    (face-attribute 'mode-line :box)

  • Expanded, reworded, or otherwise improved the manual, based on the aforementioned.

Thanks once again to everyone involved!

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