Linux

Semitransparent backgrounds for terminals are the worst. I don't mean to kinkshame, but it, imo, should not be a default.

I vastly prefer suntan background and blackish font. White on black makes my eyes tired.

Are there any sickos that use black text on white?

hello!

black text on white with comic sans. lol

Every terminal program I used allows you to set its colours independent of the global theme.

And I think all programs should follow user theming, regardless of desktop environment, widget set, or anything else. ('Scuse me while I give GTK4 the stinkeye again.) You can never tell whether someone's colour selection is a matter of accessibility rather than just personal preference, so you absolutely should not ignore it. Defaults matter very little as long as you can change them.

Not black text on white, but light grey/purple on dark grey was pretty popular with Sun Microsystems. I think OG Apple Macintosh used Black on White, or at least close enough colors.

That said I use something like this for work.

Green text on a black background with a background image that makes the terminal window look like it has scan lines.

from a design perspective, consistency is key. light mode is on? then light mode means light mode, and apps should be in light mode.

do you want both your terminal to be dark theme and your gtk apps (including all of the gnome UI) to be light theme at the same time?

do you want settings within every single app in order to change from light mode to dark mode, as opposed to a global toggle that applies to every UI on your computer?

alternatively, is the terminal the only exception to this global toggle, and this design inconsistency by having the default contradict the default of the rest of your desktop environment is your preference?

I like to use white on a transparent/glossy color.

Kind of like this (very old pic I know):

Are there any sickos that use black text on white?

Hi.

I think the other way around: I read black letters on white paper when I read a book; why shouldn't it be the same on a screen? I find the black background more fatiguing for the eyes.

Are there any sickos that use black text on white?

IIRC that’s the default on macOS if the theme is in light mode instead of dark mode. So probably.

Try having astigmatism, white text on a black background is physically painful

And make it #000 pure black if you do… I have written about why

I change mine to white text on blue background a la Commodore 64.

Pure black background makes it unreadable for me. When I encountered this on websites, i use the Firefox function to turn it into a black on white background theme, so my eyes don't hurt reading longer text. Same logic applies to the terminal, especially when programming. I think pure black as a background shouldn't be default. However I do actually appreciate darker tones as background, but its never pure black. It depends on the combination of colors for text (and on the rest of the system theme).

It makes sense to use the same setting for this, at least by default, as for dark and light mode in general. Why would you want your terminal dark but your email client bright?