Color on b&w screens

["David L. Andre" <DLA%jasper.scrc.symbolics.com@RELAY.CS.NET>]

    Date: Wed, 15 Mar 89 14:17+0100
    From: mcvax!rainbow!cla@uunet.UU.NET (Claus Riemann)

If you want symbolics developers to fix this bug, then you should send this
message not to the users group, but to Customer-Reports@Symbolics.COM.  I've
included them in this reply to save you the effort this time.

    The call of 

	    1(graphics:draw-rectangle 0 0 100 100 :color :black)

0    on a 36xx with 2*standard-output*0 attached to a window on a b&w screen with
    black-on-white mode produces a WHITE rectangle. Analogously, under the same
    conditions,

	    1(graphics:draw-rectangle 0 0 100 100 :color :white)0 

    produces a black rectangle!! I am sure that the people at Symbolics who
    implemented this had a reason for doing it this way, but, in my opinion,
    this design decision yields T when passed as argument to the function

    (defun we-dont-want-to-see-this-feature (feature)
      (not (null (member (get feature 'quality)
			 '(not_acceptable not_consistent_with_documentation
			   mad funny unbelievable bull.... ill_defined
			   to_be_fixed_in_Genera_7.5_or_in_an_earlier_ECO_patch)))))

    [In section 3Keyword Options to Drawing Functions0 of volume 7B (Programming
     the User Interface - Dictionary) of the Symbolics Documentation the following
     text appears3 0on page 450:

	   4Standard Keyword Options to Drawing Functions

0	   <text deleted>

	   5:color6 0                                                     7Option

0	       8Specifies a color to be used for output on a device that6 8supports
0	       8color.6 8On devices that do not support color, a6 8gray-level pattern
0	       8appropriate to the intensity of the specified6 8color is displayed
0	       8instead.6 8The possible choices are: 5:black8,6 5:red8, 5:green8, 5:blue8,
0	       5:cyan8, 5:yellow8, 5:magenta8, and6 5:white8.0]

    I
    - WANT to get the drawn object colored as I specified it and as one would expect
      in black-on-white mode
    - don't want to specify the complement color, since my system (an object-oriented
      graphics editor) runs on a variety of Symbolics machines (all types of b&w and
      some color versions)
    - don't want to make a case analysis of the machine type.

    Any ideas what to do?

       --cla

    PS
    1. Please don't tell me to press FUNCTION-C.
    2. On a XL400, it behaves just as on a 36xx.
    3. It works correctly on a MacIvory with b&w screen! 

    ***************************************************************************
    These are my own opinions and they do not necessarily reflect the opinions
    of the German National Research Center for Computer Science or anyone else.

    Claus Riemann (F3.MMK)  [riemann@gmdzi.UUCP] {...!uunet!unido!gmdzi!riemann}
    German National Research Center for Computer Science (GMD)
    Box 1240
    Schloss Birlinghoven
    D-5205 Sankt Augustin 1
    Federal Republic of Germany