sysinstall colours

[Alexander Best]

Randi Harper schrieb am 2009-10-10:
> On Fri, Oct 9, 2009 at 12:52 PM, Alexander Best <
> alexbestms at math.uni-muenster.de> wrote:

> > hi there,

> > sysinstall is probably one of those ancient relics everybody tries
> > to avoid
> > dealing with from a developers point of view but i just found this
> > beautiful
> > screenie of a (probably) ncurse-based installer:


> > http://www.phoronix.net/image.php?id=yoper_2009_beta&image=yoper_dresden_7_lrg

> > i was surprised how much better it looks with those nice colours
> > compared
> > to
> > sysinstall.

> > is there any way the sysinstall colours could be adjusted (without
> > a lot of
> > work) to also feature such beautiful colours? i had a quick look at
> > the
> > sysinstall, libdialog and ncurses sources and to me it seems that
> > to change
> > sysinstall's colours the hardcoded values of

> > COLOR_BLACK
> > COLOR_RED
> > COLOR_GREEN
> > COLOR_YELLOW
> > COLOR_BLUE
> > COLOR_MAGENTA
> > COLOR_CYAN
> > COLOR_WHITE

> > have to be changed in contrib/ncurses/ncurses/base/lib_color.c or
> > is there
> > an
> > easier way? because this would of course affect all apps that are
> > linked to
> > ncurses.

> > cheers.
> > alex


> Seriously?!?!?! All the problems with sysinstall, and your idea is to
> change
> the color? Are you trying to start a bikeshed? If so, I prefer pink.

> -- randi

of course sysinstall has a ton of problems and should be replaced. no doubt
about it. but look at it from this angle:

current developers don't seem to have any interest in improving sysinstall. so
it's important to get new people involved in freebsd. and the way to do that
is with an attractive looking installer and an easy installation process imo.

sure a good installer doesn't make a good os. but let's face it. when you've
been running windows for a few years and finally want to switch to something
else you're likely looking for an os which doesn't frighten you off right at
the start (which freebsd sort of does).

so i think having a good looking installer is more than just eyecandy. i don't
think hardcore developers who prefer working with a bare X and vi(m)/emacs and
so forth should look down on people who are slowly starting to get involved in
an os, because without new people freebsd will someday be dead.

alex