My Syntax Highlighting
One of the most obvious benefits to code editors and IDEs is being able to customize all the pretty colors that we must stare at for hours on end. It’s our decoration. It’s our wardrobe. So let me show off my own code outfitting.
Monstar Code
I’ve toyed around with various schemes, and have settled on my preferred colors. It might be influenced from the first time I used an editor in college (Eclipse), but it’s changed and grown some.
I recall some people at my former work quite liked the inverted look. You know, light colors on a black or dark grey background. I wanted to like it: it kinda seems cool. But ultimately it was a little too weird for me.
However, this is a shot of my color scheme in Komodo (I try to duplicate the scheme in any editor I use).
I’ll list the colors I use:
- Keywords - Blue. This would things like public, function, true, false, null, if, for, return, etc.
- Variables - Light blue.
- Strings - Green.
- Operators - Black. Arithmetic, assignment, parenthesis, the like.
- Numbers - Dark Brown.
- Comments - Grey. I prefer comments to be more hidden unless I specifically want to read them.
- Identifiers - Black. These are function calls, or accessing properties of objects.
- Standard Library - Red. Methods or constants defined in the standard library, I like them to stick out so I know when I’m using native functions (ex:print_r, preg_match, etc).
You’ll also see that I enjoy a slightly off-white background, to cut down on the extreme photon abuse of my eyes. Just feels less… painful.
Other Editors
Komodo (seen above) doesn’t allow me to do my last list item, coloring standard library names. I certainly wish it did, and if you know how, please do tell. However, I also use UltraEdit as it opens faster and uses less memory, and it _does_allow me to set standard functions red. I believe Eclipse allowed me to do this (it’s been a while use I’ve used it), and my recent checking out of Aptana showed it was possible.
In fact, Aptana seemed to have the more power for customizing color schemes. Not only could you select colors for groups of syntax, like ‘keywords’, you could then drill into keywords and say specifically that for and while should be different colors.
Besides Color
When given the option, I also enjoy when an editor allows me to modify the fonts of specific syntax. I like making comments italic, as it just seems to help make them… sleeker, more invisible, except when I need them. I don’t use it personally, but I could see benefit to maybe adding bold to identifiers, or keywords, to make sure you don’t miss out on any returns, for instance.
Of the many differences between coders, syntax highlighting is nearly a constant. However, coloring styles differ, as certain colors might have different psychological effects on the viewer.
