Bug 152923 - Column and row headings hard to distinguish from sheet and window
Summary: Column and row headings hard to distinguish from sheet and window
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Calc (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
7.5.0.1 rc
Hardware: All All
: medium enhancement
Assignee: Heiko Tietze
URL:
Whiteboard: target:24.8.0
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2023-01-08 10:31 UTC by Andy
Modified: 2024-06-01 06:42 UTC (History)
2 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


Attachments
Comparison of screenshots of Calc between LO6 and LO7.5.0.1 (67.87 KB, image/png)
2023-01-08 10:32 UTC, Andy
Details
There you go with the white headers in Calc (312.19 KB, image/jpeg)
2023-01-19 10:22 UTC, Andy
Details
Screenshot with patch applied (14.11 KB, image/png)
2024-05-29 15:42 UTC, Heiko Tietze
Details

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Description Andy 2023-01-08 10:31:04 UTC
Description:
While the coloumn and row headings in a Calc file have always been colored in light grey and featuring a "3D" look, this is gone in 7.5.0.1.
Now these heading are falt white just as the cells themselves, making it more difficult to locate them quickly and instinctively. This may seem a trifle, but I must say that while performing fast, quick work with Calc I suffered the less evident display of such headings significantly.
I do not know if this was a deliberate change based on some rationale I cannot grasp; IMHO it is a regression and would be much better to be reversed to the previous fashion.
P.S.: I also searched for a way to change the headings colour in the specific tab of program options, but could not find anything useful

Steps to Reproduce:
1.open a new calc file
2.look at column and row headings
3.they are white and flat

Actual Results:
The headings are more difficult to locate on the fly

Expected Results:
Such headings should be highlighted - as in previous releases - by a grey, 3d appearance so to easily and quicly distinguish them from common cells


Reproducible: Always


User Profile Reset: No

Additional Info:
Version: 7.5.0.1 (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: 77cd3d7ad4445740a0c6cf977992dafd8ebad8df
CPU threads: 8; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 17763; UI render: Skia/Raster; VCL: win
Locale: it-IT (it_IT); UI: it-IT
Calc: threaded
Comment 1 Andy 2023-01-08 10:32:11 UTC
Created attachment 184523 [details]
Comparison of screenshots of Calc between LO6 and LO7.5.0.1
Comment 2 Andy 2023-01-10 10:13:56 UTC
It seems this issue is not of interest to anyone.... 
At least an option to choose a color for the headings should be added to option dialog on color....
Thank you
Comment 3 Roman Kuznetsov 2023-01-16 20:39:02 UTC
Heiko you made this change, if I remember right, and it was an UX dicision. 

And I don't see any reasons to revert it now

@Andy: please be more patient. thanks
Comment 4 Andy 2023-01-16 21:05:12 UTC
Sorry for the impatience.... where could I find some info on the motivation/rationale for this change?
Maybe I am just unable to perceive its advantages....

At the moment, the reasons I see to undo this are instead clear:

- it becomes more difficult to distinguish the headings from the editable cells - this way, for instance, a D1 Cell with a centered "D", 8 points size, any sans serif font, a thin border is just identical and undistinguishable from the heading above it. With the previous heading style the chances of this occurring were radically lower.

- it gives the general impression of a less well defined and identified allocation of the screen space

- finally, I do not want to say that you should always follow others, but neither Excel nor Google Sheets have this kind of "headings invisibility".

Having said this, I am eager to try understand what motivated the decision, and open to change my view if I find those reasons convincing.
All the best
Comment 5 Heiko Tietze 2023-01-17 06:42:34 UTC
Indeed it was a deliberate decision for bug 127508. The world has become flat (design-wise 3D-effects like this add noise and make the UI unnecessarily busy).
Comment 6 Andy 2023-01-17 17:23:36 UTC
I carefully examined bug 127508, including all the attachments, and realised that the discussion centered of the "3d" look of the headers, not on their color.

IMHO the "flatness" trend is not that exciting visually, but let's skip this. It is obviously a matter of taste, and of course I cannot pretend hat other share mine.

In one of the above bug comment, you write;
"How row/col headers are painted, meaning with or without gradient, depend on your system theme". And it's the white color of headers I have that is the main issue, not 3D versus flat.
So I am asking if you would please let me know what setting of the windows 10 theme I should alter to get Calc headers not exactly white as the editable cells. Almost any color would do, the goal is to easily distinguish them from the cells.
Thank you for your patience!
Comment 7 Heiko Tietze 2023-01-18 08:19:39 UTC
(In reply to Andy from comment #6)
> In one of the above bug comment, you write;
> "How row/col headers are painted, meaning with or without gradient, depend
> on your system theme".

I was wrong back then. LibreOffice draws everything itself.

(In reply to Andy from comment #4)
> - it becomes more difficult to distinguish the headings from the editable
> cells - this way, for instance, a D1 Cell with a centered "D", 8 points
> size, any sans serif font, a thin border is just identical and
> undistinguishable from the heading above it.

This might be true if you apply the same background color as the header. But theoretically you could also use a gradient in a cell that mimics the old header look and feel - making this hard to distinguish.
Comment 8 Andy 2023-01-18 14:33:19 UTC
Thanks for the feedback. Now you write "This might be true if you apply the same background color as the header"; but to me the headers are now stuck to white and I could not find any way to alter this - not by changing the LO "theme", nor by an item in the "Options/application colours" dialog.

You say that the header color is set by LO itself: "I was wrong back then. LibreOffice draws everything itself." 
But is there any way for the end user to change such header background color that I have not figured out? If there is please let me know and the issue is over!

If not, it seems that the only way to "solve" this is to change the background color of all cells of all calc documents from white to , say, pink or whatever (this is indeed available in "Options/application colours" dialog). I may be stubborn or old-fashioned in this regard, but I'd rather keep the document background in white, as "neutral", as a piece of virtual paper, also because this setting applies to all types of documents, and thus I would end up having not white pages in Writer as well, a thing which again seems quite unnatural.

In all, if there is no way to make headers color changeble, and adding a setting in the color options is unfeasible for some reasons, then it would be better to be stuck to headers in light grey, as in Excel - than white.

Thanks again,
Comment 9 Heiko Tietze 2023-01-19 09:09:33 UTC
(In reply to Andy from comment #8)
> ...to me the headers are now stuck to white

Do you have high contrast enabled? Please share a screenshot of the issue.
Comment 10 Andy 2023-01-19 10:22:43 UTC
Created attachment 184776 [details]
There you go with the white headers in Calc

As to your question, High contrast is NOT enabled.
Comment 11 Heiko Tietze 2023-01-19 10:32:49 UTC
Hm... let me take a closer look. Reopening.
Comment 12 Heiko Tietze 2024-05-29 15:42:33 UTC
Created attachment 194428 [details]
Screenshot with patch applied

Linux/KDE with Breeze Dark vs. Breeze (Light)
Comment 13 Commit Notification 2024-06-01 06:42:22 UTC
Heiko Tietze committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "master":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/0a0d3d1f8a34e0b8542c71fe9c3bd3b75d974e7c

Resolves tdf#152923 - Make column header outstanding from background

It will be available in 24.8.0.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.