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`compiler:pp -s` and `compiler:pp -v dump` should have colors

Open Hywan opened this issue 9 years ago • 28 comments

@jubianchi did a good POC with it. It is a great idea. We should do that. Maybe @jubianchi could explain more.


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Hywan avatar Mar 11 '16 14:03 Hywan

let me show an example :

slides 008

This is a custom colorization I made manually in one of my slides.

What should be done:

  • [ ] Choose a color for namespace names
  • [ ] Choose a color for token names
  • [ ] Choose a color for token values
  • [ ] Choose a color for rules
  • [ ] Use those color in the token sequence (-s) output
  • [ ] Use those color in the dump visitor (-v dump) output
  • [ ] Use those color in the trace (-t) output

jubianchi avatar Mar 11 '16 15:03 jubianchi

Why not using automatic color for the namespace and for tokens?

Hywan avatar Mar 14 '16 12:03 Hywan

@Hywan what do you mean by "automatic color" ?

jubianchi avatar Mar 14 '16 12:03 jubianchi

@jubianchi Automatic color selection, in a palette. Each token or namespace without a color has a color attached automatically, and it remains attached. This way, this is easy to track the token by its color instead of its name.

Hywan avatar Mar 14 '16 12:03 Hywan

@jubianchi For instance, regarding your example, T_NUMBER will be blue, T_OP_PLUS will be orange, T_VAR will be red, but T_OP_EQUAL will not be orange but pink instead. All token value will have the color associated to its token name. Same for namespace.

Hywan avatar Mar 14 '16 12:03 Hywan

@Hywan good idea! let me try something when I get some time ;)

jubianchi avatar Mar 14 '16 13:03 jubianchi

Moreover, I would like something like highlight_code for a beautiful display ;)

1e1 avatar Mar 14 '16 17:03 1e1

I experimented with some algorithms to colorize the output and it seems hard to do it automatically:

  • we have to generate random color with reasonable distance, or
  • we have to hardcode a color palette which is large enough to deal with with huge grammars, but
  • we would have to take care of user's terminal background (color cannot be the same on light and dark backgrounds)

If we choose to generate random color on-the-fly, we will have to add too much code (IMHO) to compute random colors, deal with distances between them, etc.

If we choose to hardcode a palette, we would have to hardcode two palettes: one for light backgrounds and one for dark ones. Or we have to find a palette working with both backgrounds.

jubianchi avatar Mar 14 '16 21:03 jubianchi

example palette (80 colors):

capture d ecran 2016-03-14 a 23 01 59

jubianchi avatar Mar 14 '16 22:03 jubianchi

Can we specify in an other file, which color to join for each token. Perhaps a %filename%.pp-lut relative to %filename%.pp

1e1 avatar Mar 14 '16 23:03 1e1

Or shall we think about a "check style" tool? An extra file setup the coding style and the token style (text color, line break, spacing, etc) Perhaps there is the same thought.

1e1 avatar Mar 14 '16 23:03 1e1

@1e1 I don't understand what you're talking about. We are talking about colorizing the output of some compiler:pp command, not to colorize a PP grammar.

@jubianchi Let me ask some colleague designers. Having a pre-defined palette sounds good for me. Else we would have to start a Hoa\Color library and we don't have time for this right now. Your proposed palette seems excellent. What is the source?

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 07:03 Hywan

@Hywan I randomly generateed 256 colors and manually removed those not fitting in both backgrounds

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 07:03 jubianchi

@Hywan I thought it is to highlight a rule written from a PP file.

1e1 avatar Mar 15 '16 08:03 1e1

@jubianchi Good work.

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 08:03 Hywan

@ghn points me this https://github.com/mbostock/d3/wiki/Ordinal-Scales#categorical-colors. These palettes have not been designed to work on both light and black backgrounds, but we can maybe find some inspiration there.

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 08:03 Hywan

Example output with the 80 colors palette:

capture d ecran 2016-03-15 a 10 05 50

For each new token we shift a color from the palette and use it.

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 jubianchi

How do you choose colors in your palette? Are colors already ordered by distance (in which space?)? Do you choose colors by the maximum distance each time?

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 Hywan

How do you choose colors in your palette?

For each new token we shift a color from the palette and use it.

Are colors already ordered by distance (in which space?)?

No.

Do you choose colors by the maximum distance each time?

No.

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 jubianchi

And here is an example trace output:

capture d ecran 2016-03-15 a 10 19 39

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 jubianchi

Sounds good. Colors are a little bit too “agressive”, thoughts?

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 Hywan

@Hywan yes the colors are not optimal :/

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 09:03 jubianchi

But this is an excellent start! I am going to ask for a “““palette flatter”””

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 10:03 Hywan

@ghn provides me this other resource: http://kentor.me/posts/generating-pastel-colors-for-css/. @jubianchi, it can help you a lot I guess.

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 10:03 Hywan

And so this: https://randomcolor.llllll.li/ (a PHP port exists, for inspiration).

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 10:03 Hywan

@Hywan I searched yesterday for libraries doing good colors randomization and I found https://randomcolor.llllll.li/ was really promising but to do things well, we should port it.

jubianchi avatar Mar 15 '16 11:03 jubianchi

@jubianchi Isn't it possible to develop a very minimal algorithm?

Hywan avatar Mar 15 '16 12:03 Hywan

@jubianchi do you want to post your code in a github repository somewhere? Maybe some people can take it as a starting point and continue your work if you don't longer want it.

flip111 avatar Jan 25 '19 15:01 flip111