268 lines
11 KiB
Markdown
268 lines
11 KiB
Markdown
---
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title: Midnight Desktop
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layout: post
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---
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I tend to use Linux (Ubuntu) on my desktop late at night in a dark room. To
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protect my eyes from the blinding light of my monitors I've tooled my desktop
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environment over the course of a few months to be as dark as possible. It has
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gotten complex enough that I thought it would be worth sharing now.
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### dotfiles
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Before I begin, I want to note that all the configuration for the setup I'm
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describing is stored in a [dotfiles repo on my github
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profile](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles). If you would like to replicate
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any of this setup, I would go there. Just note that I will probably be updating
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the master branch fairly often, but the
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[midnight](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/tree/midnight) branch will
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always contain the setup described here.
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### bspwm
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Inspired by [/r/unixporn](http://www.reddit.com/r/unixporn), I decided to switch
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from gnome to bspwm, a minimal tiling window manager that positions windows like
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leaves on a binary tree.
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I don't really use the tiling features that often, though. I often do most of my
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work in the terminal and [tmux](http://tmux.sourceforge.net/) does the terminal
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pane management. But, when I do open another application, it's nice that bspwm
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forces it to use the maximum available space.
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I also like how hackable the whole manager is. There is a terminal command
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`bspc` that controls the entire desktop environment and a separate program
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`sxhkd` (probably the hardest program name ever to remember) handles all of the
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hotkeys for the environment. All of them are stored in a
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[`sxhkdrc`](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/sxhkd/.config/sxhkd/sxhkdrc)
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under the home directory and it's super easy to add my own. The hotkeys make
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this superior to gnome for me because I never have to touch my mouse to move
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around the desktop.
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### gnome and gtk
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I still love some of the features from gnome. Especially the text hinting, which
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is why I still run `gnome-settings-daemon` in my [bspwm startup
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script](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/bspwm/bin/bspwm-session).
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To make gtk applications universally dark (and also to tune text hinting)
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install the `gnome-tweak-tool`. There should be a "Global Dark Theme" setting
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under the "Appearance" tab that can be enabled. I use the
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[Numix](https://numixproject.org/) gtk theme which seems to behave fine with
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this setting.
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### Gnome Terminal
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I've tried using a few other lighter-weight terminals like xterm, but I still
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like the features of gnome-terminal more. I created a "bspwm" profile and set
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the background to be transparent with opacity at about half-way on the slider.
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My background, set in the [bspwm startup
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script](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/bspwm/bin/bspwm-session)
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is a subtle [dark tiling pattern](http://subtlepatterns.com/dark-mosaic/) so
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this effectively makes the background of the terminal dark.
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In my
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[sxhkdrc](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/sxhkd/.config/sxhkd/sxhkdrc)
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I can then map my hotkeys for starting a new terminal to the command
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`gnome-terminal --window-with-profile=bspwm`.
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### vim
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Making vim dark is pretty easy. Just put this in the
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[`.vimrc`](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/vim/.vimrc):
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~~~ vim
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set background=dark
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~~~
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I use the colorscheme
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[distinguished](https://github.com/Lokaltog/vim-distinguished) which is
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installed by putting the `distinguished.vim` file under
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[`~/.vim/colors/`](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/tree/master/vim/.vim/colors)
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and adding this to the `.vimrc`:
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~~~ vim
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colorscheme distinguished
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~~~
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### tmux/byobu
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I like the abstraction that [byobu](http://byobu.co/) puts ontop of tmux, so
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that's what I use in the terminal. Colors can be configured by editing the
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[`~/.byobu/color.tmux`](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/byobu/.byobu/color.tmux)
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file. This is what I have in mine:
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BYOBU_DARK="\#333333"
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BYOBU_LIGHT="\#EEEEEE"
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BYOBU_ACCENT="\#4D2100"
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BYOBU_HIGHLIGHT="\#303030"
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MONOCHROME=0
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### evince
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I tell my browser, firefox, to open pdfs in evince (aka. Document Viewer)
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because evince can darken pdfs.
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Select View > Invert Colors and then Edit > Save Current Settings as Default and
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now most pdfs will be displayed as white text on black background.
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### gimp
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Gimp allows you to change themes easily. [Gimp GTK2 Photoshop CS6
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Theme](http://gnome-look.org/content/show.php?content=160952) is my favorite
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dark theme. Put that in `~/.gimp-2.8/themes/` (or whichever gimp version is
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installed) and, in Gimp, change the theme at Edit > Preferences > Theme.
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### Firefox
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I had to hack firefox a lot to get it to be universally dark since the web
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(unfortunately!) doesn't have a night mode switch. I'm using firefox instead of
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chrome because firefox has better customization for doing something this
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extreme.
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#### Userstyles
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Firefox has a really neat addon called
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[Stylish](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/firefox/addon/stylish/) that allows
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you to install and edit user CSS files to change the style of any website you
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visit. A lot of popular websites have dark themes on
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[userstyles.org](https://userstyles.org/), but the rest of the internet still
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mostly has a white background by default.
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Luckily there's a few global dark themes. [Midnight Surfing
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Alternative](https://userstyles.org/styles/47391/midnight-surfing-alternative)
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seemed to work the best for me.
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However, since the theme is global, it overwrites the custom tailored dark
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themes that I had installed for specific popular sites (listed below) making the
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sites ugly. The Midnight Surfing Alternative theme can be edited through the
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Stylish extension to exclude the websites that I already have dark themes for.
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[This superuser question explains what to
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edit](http://superuser.com/questions/463153/disable-stylish-on-certain-sites-in-firefox).
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Now, whenever I add a new dark theme to Stylish, I edit the regex to add the
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domains it covers to the parenthesized list that is delimited by pipes.
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~~~ css
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@-moz-document regexp("(https?|liberator|file)://(?!([^.]+\\.)?(maps\\.google\\.com|...other domains....)[/:]).*"){
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~~~
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Here is the list of dark themes I'm currently using with Stylish in addition to
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Midnight Surfing Alternative:
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* [Amazon Dark -
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VisualPlastik](https://userstyles.org/styles/52294/amazon-dark-visualplastik)
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* [Dark Feedly
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(Hauschild's)](https://userstyles.org/styles/89622/dark-feedly-hauschild-s)
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* [Dark Gmail mod by
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Karsonito](https://userstyles.org/styles/107544/dark-gmail-mod-by-karsonito)
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(this one is a bit buggy right now, though)
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* [Dark Netflix
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[GRiMiNTENT]](https://userstyles.org/styles/102627/dark-netflix-grimintent)
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* [dark-facebook 2 [a dark facebook
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theme]](https://userstyles.org/styles/95359/facebook-dark-facebook-2-a-dark-facebook-theme)
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* [Forecast.io - hide
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map](https://userstyles.org/styles/104812/forecast-io-hide-map)
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* [GitHub Dark](https://userstyles.org/styles/37035/github-dark) (this one is
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really well done, I love it)
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* [Google Play (Music) Dark \*Updated
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5-15\*](https://userstyles.org/styles/107643/google-play-music-dark-updated-5-15)
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* [Messenger.com Dark](https://userstyles.org/styles/112722/messenger-com-dark)
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* [Telegram web dark / custom
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color](https://userstyles.org/styles/109612/telegram-web-dark-custom-color)
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* [Youtube - Lights Out - A Dark Youtube
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Theme](https://userstyles.org/styles/92164/youtube-lights-out-a-dark-youtube-theme)
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#### UI Themes
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Most of my firefox UI is styled dark with the [FT
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DeepDark](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/ft-deepdark/) theme.
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The firefox developer tools can be [themed dark in its
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settings](http://soledadpenades.com/2014/11/20/using-the-firefox-developer-edition-dark-theme-with-nightly/).
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#### Addons
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For reddit, I use the [RES](http://redditenhancementsuite.com/) addon which has
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a night mode option.
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I also use [Custom New
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Tab](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/custom-new-tab/) combined
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with [homepage.py](https://github.com/ok100/homepage.py) to display a list of my
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favorite websites when I start a new tab.
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[Vimperator](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/vimperator/) allows
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me to control firefox completely with my keyboard which is really useful when I
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am switching back and forth between firefox and vim. By default, the vimperator
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window has a white background, so I had to [set it to a dark
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theme](https://github.com/vimpr/vimperator-colors). Also, in order to make all
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of the vimperator help pages dark, I had to add the protocol `liberator://` to
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the regex for Midnight Surfing Alternative (exact syntax for that above).
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### Redshift
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At night, it's also useful to filter out blue light to help with sleep.
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[Redshift](http://jonls.dk/redshift/) is a utility that does this automatically
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while running in the background.
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### Invert it all!
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I noticed that with the dark colors and my monitor brightness turned low, it was
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hard to see the screen during the day because of glares. An easy solution to
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this is to simply invert the colors on the output of the monitor into an instant
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day theme.
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I would have used the command `xcalib -a -i` but that would only work on one
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monitor and I have two. Luckily, someone made a utility that would invert colors
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on more than one monitor called
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[xrandr-invert-colors](https://github.com/zoltanp/xrandr-invert-colors).
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The only problem was that this utility seemed to interfere with redshift, so I
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made [a script that would disable redshift before
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inverting](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/blob/master/invert/bin/invert).
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~~~ bash
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#!/bin/bash
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inverted=$(xcalib -a -p | head -c 1)
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if [ "$inverted" == "W" ]
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then
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if [ -z "$(pgrep redshift)" ]
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then
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xrandr-invert-colors
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redshift &
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fi
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else
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if [ -z "$(pgrep redshift)" ]
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then
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xrandr-invert-colors
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else
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killall redshift
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sleep 3
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xrandr-invert-colors
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fi
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fi
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~~~
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And, now I have [a
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shortcut](https://github.com/thallada/dotfiles/commit/e5153a90fa7c89a0e2ca16e5943f0fa20d4a9512)
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to invert the screen.
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However, images and videos look pretty ugly inverted. VLC has a setting under
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Tools > Effects and Filters > Video Effects > Colors called Negate colors that
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can fix that.
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For firefox, I made a global userstyle to invert images and videos.
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~~~ css
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@-moz-document regexp("(https?|liberator|file)://(?!([^.]+\\.)?[/:]).*"){
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img, video, div.html5-video-container, div.player-api, span.emoji, i.emoji, span.emoticon, object[type="application/x-shockwave-flash"], embed[type="application/x-shockwave-flash"] {
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filter: invert(100%);
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}
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}
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~~~
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Whenever I invert the colors, I enable that global theme on firefox.
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