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Comment by Davidbrcz | Hacker News Reader

God, the dark mode change reading is a blessing !

See https://drgrizz.xyz/dark-mode.html why

The person in question has a relatively rare medical condition, for most people dark mode reduces readability as a darker screen leads to more pupil dilation which causes halation. (which you can test out yourself if you stare at dark mode text and then look at a bright surface, you'll likely literally see a halo of the text).

This is worse in people with astigmatism, which is about 35-50% of the population. Dark mode defaults, as on that website, need to die. Most of the time they're used because people use their digital devices like goblins in a cave and don't light their rooms properly, or configure their brightness settings correctly.

Surely this can't be that universal, right? I will have to do this test at some point. I have astigmatism but I find the default bright version of websites frequently painful to look at. I have no clue why but I need the dark versions.

My strategy has been to use light mode all around but I have f.lux set to about 20% strength all day long. I also have my monitors dimmed a fair amount unless I want to display HDR. It also helps to have a bias light behind your screens if you can.

My goal was to get rid of the 2pm eye twitch and I've mostly got it.

If websites are generally too bright, you can save energy as part of increasing comfort by configuring your display to put out fewer nits (reduce its brightness setting). Usually people have the opposite problem, especially if there's direct sunlight on or near the screen, so that's probably what the factory default optimises for

> So please fellow developers, help spread the darkness to make the world more inclusive.

He ought to practice what he preaches. Due to a combo of shitty eyes and dyslexia, I cannot read his site's dark theme without getting a headache.

I’m not sure what you’re asking for that person to fix, it’s just plain text and a plain dark background.

You can also read the site in reader mode.

If you have astigmatism dark mode is hell. Should be called nausea mode.

First time I hear someone describe nausea from dark mode. Quickly looked astigmatism up on Wikipedia - isn't that something glasses fully correct? I think I've got this as well, but not sure, I've just always had glasses and take whatever they measure to be the best possible lens

(Of course I critically evaluate the measurement, like one time I actually couldn't read faraway text with what they were proposing whereas I could with my old glasses. But I don't know the exact values or terms for the different defects, I think my eyes have at least three different issues including something about rotation as astigmatism apparently means)

I guess what I'm asking is why you don't have glasses. Are they too expensive in your area, or the defect only very minor so it doesn't impede safety when driving even on highways? (Then I'm surprised you get nauseous though, since I don't when I read anything without glasses, regardless of dark or light mode.) Or if you do have glasses, is this still an issue while wearing them? If so, any idea why?

I have glasses. They greatly ameliorate the issue, but not completely. My prescription is a single number which I don’t believe has the necessary granularity (I think, intervals of 0.25) to express the exact prescription I need. I also suspect that astigmatism is a deformation of parts of the eye that cannot be expressed with a single number. It’s possible I should have gone to an ophthalmologist instead of an optician in a mall but that’s what I did.

Also I generally don’t wear the glasses unless I’m working (with a computer of course) or driving. I also have myopia, but both my astigmatism and my myopia are mild. The problem is much more severe when it’s dark, so I always wear my glasses when it’s dark and I very rarely wear them during the day. I must always wear them if I intend to use the computer for a long time, though. Especially if I’m staring at a terminal or whatever else with white letters on a black background. But I don’t need them to read (black on white, not too far away) or to use my mobile (always closer to my face than my monitor).

Judging the distance/speed of other cars during the night without glasses is simply impossible despite my mild prescription.

This is very interesting, thanks for sharing details. A friend with strong corrections in their glasses always mentions they feel like they can't see much in the dark, not as much as other people anyway, but we've never been able to quantify it (that they don't see something that I do). That you always wear them in the dark sounds to me like it's indeed more important to correct this effect for dark backgrounds, which I had no idea about

Another comment I saw in the meantime, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44520306, proposes a mechanism for why one might have what I'd call ghosting if it were a computer screen (apparently it's called halation for eyes). That that can lead to nausea or generally feeling like things swim together and you can't see as well makes sense, this might explain a lot

I'll mention this to the friend and maybe we can do some tests in the dark with moving objects rather than just "can you see that thing there". Maybe after all these years we can get to the bottom of this issue they've had all these years :D

It’s not ghosting, it’s halation as that bloke said. Bright things do not leave a trail, instead they are just blurry.

If I see a white LED in the dark, the LED shows some sort of smear at a certain angle and with a certain length. The length of the smear decreases the closer I get to the LED. It doesn’t change ever, even if days pass, because it’s a static deformation inside my eye. It does not leave a trail if I look around or if I move the object with the LED.

This also applies to white letters on a black screen. They are smeared at an angle. If I’m far away enough and/or the letters are small enough the smear is so large that they make it hard to read and make me nauseous. That’s why I ended up buying the glasses.

https://pixelbuddha.net/storage/51621/how-to-create-a-motion...

This is an example. The trail is not as long but it’s brighter. (Just googled “motion blur letters” - the effect is similar)

Oh! I see, I guess the "then look at a bright surface" part of that other post made me think of that an image stays with you for a short time (a ghost image), but I get what you mean now

They could include a light theme.

It seems pretty hypocritical that they're claiming a lack of dark mode is an accessibility problem while lacking a light mode.

Technically it’s not really hypocritical because the author never claimed that a lack of light mode is an accessibility problem.

I think it’s also notable that websites being accessible isn’t really about being tied to a specific theme, it’s about being compatible with accessibility tooling and standards (screen readers as an example). There are plenty of CSS manipulation tools that can make a website look whatever way you want.

Then all that'd apply to sites not having a dark theme, undercutting the author's point because he could just use stylus to.make his own dark theme for sites.

And if I understand you right, you completely miss the point of the article.

I'm already resorting to tools and workarounds (ie Dark mode reader, invert image extensions, invert colors on phone). But

  - they are workarounds, cumbersome, and don't always work well. 
  - I'm tech-savvy, if you are not and suffer the same condition, you are fucked.

Builtin dark mode on websites and apps would just be net benefit for me for little cost.

You understood them wrong I think. dangus seemed to suggest CSS manipulation tools were enough for people who wanted a light theme.

I never thought that dark mode could make things less readable. I'll lokk into it. Though I don't know what Pelican offers to switch theme live.

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