[Geany-devel] Textmate color schemes convertion

[Lex Trotman]

Hi guys,

A few extra notes on Matthew's reply

> I think you'll find it more pleasant to work with the setup used in
> geany-themes[1].  It's fixes all the problems you're having, would make
> writing a converter much easier (I started one for Gedit->Geany themes), and
> it will likely be incorporated into Geany[2] proper in the near future.  If
> you do write a Textmate->Geany color scheme converter using the named styles
> geany-themes is using, I would *really* like to add it to the project, and
> also use it to create a bunch more themes.  There's a little explanation in
> the README in the repository, but you should be able to figure it out by
> poking around in the directories there.  Feel free to contact me if you have
> any questions.
>
> Still, I will try and answer your questions below to help it make sense.
>
>>
>> 1. Where can I find full list of official [named_styles] properties? I
>> can't find it in the manual.
>
> You pick the names as you desire.

But if you don't want to change the filetype files then look in those
for what names they use and also look in filetypes.common for what
names it defines.  For languages that use named styles, you shouldn't
invent new names otherwise the defaults won't work and we won't be
able to share your work.

As the note in the documentation says, not all filetypes have been
converted to use colorschemes yet, nobody using that language has
cared enough, but feel free to submit patches if you do your favorite
language.

>
> If you're familiar with CSS/HTML, it might be easier to use an example.
>
> Where in CSS you would do:
>
>  .my_named_style { some coloring/bold/etc... }
>
> In a colorschemes *.conf file, you would do:
>
>  [named_styles]
>  my_named_style=fgcolor;bgcolor;bold;italic
>
> And where in a X/HTML file you would do:
>
>  <div name="comment" class="my_named_style">...
>
> In the filetypes.* files you would do:
>
>  [styles]
>  comment=my_named_style
>
> I hope that makes sense.
>
>> 2. Why it is not possible to define [styling] properties in color scheme
>> files?
>
> You make the [styling] keys in the filedefs use (point to) the named style
> keys in your [named_styles] section in your colorscheme *.conf files.

Since [styling] sections have no name there is no way to refer to them
from filetypes files, so they would be unusable.

>
>> 3. Have I to overwrite filetypes.common to make well converted color
>> scheme?
>
> Some of the non-language specific styles are in filetypes.common, like the
> color of the line numbers margin, fold margins, caret/cursor, etc.

No, it provides the default colorscheme, don't change that.

>
>> 4. Have I to overwrite all filetypes.* files to make them depend on
>> filetypes.common (on better colorscheme/*.conf) file?
>
> Technically, yes, but I think it's because no one ever got around to
> finishing the named styles stuff in all of the filedefs.
>

Yep, somebody has to do it, patches are welcome (tm)

BTW don't overwrite the files in the system directory, put your
modified ones in the user config directory as described in the docs.

>>
>> I don't entirely understand what is filetypes.common for and why it is
>> not just a default color scheme in colorschemes/ subdirectory.
>
> Like I said above, it has editor styles in it that aren't language-specific,
> also, the [named_styles] section in filetypes.common is what's used for the
> "Default" theme/named styles for filedefs supporting it.

Backwards compatibility, filetypes.common existed before colorschemes.
 If the name was changed then user setups would break on upgrading.

Cheers
Lex