DIR_COLORS, How to change blue to a darker blue, such as "Navy"?

[Paul Johnson]

On Dec 28, 2007 10:00 AM, Daniel B. Thurman <dant at cdkkt.com> wrote:
>
> I am fiddling with /etc/X11/app-defaults/XTerm-color, thinking that this is where
> /etc/DIR_COLORS, 34/44=blue are being defined assuming an xterm window?
>
> My problem is that blue (0,0,255) is a bright dazzling blue color and
> I need to tone it down a bit to something like "Navy" in X terminology.
>
> How can this be done or is it hardwired?
>
> Thanks!
>

Maybe I'm telling you what you already know, but since nobody
mentioned this old unix trick, maybe it will help.  I would not fiddle
around in X resoures the way you are when there are easier, more
general alternatives.

In my .bashrc, I have this to customize the colors of the particular
things in the terminal.  I like bright yello directories, white text,
because all of my backgrounds are dark.  These settings are used in
xterm, Eterm, MLterm, gnome-terminal, etc.  di is directory, and 33 is
yellow.

# User specific aliases and functions

LS_COLORS='no=00:fi=00:di=01;33:ln=01;36:pi=40;33:so=01;35:do=01;35:bd=40;33;01:cd=40;33;01:or=40;31;01:su=37;41:sg=30;43:tw=30;42:ow=34;42:st=37;44:ex=01;32:*.tar=01;31:*.tgz=01;31:*.arj=01;31:*.taz=01;31:*.lzh=01;31:*.zip=01;31:*.z=01;31:*.Z=01;31:*.gz=01;31:*.bz2=01;31:*.deb=01;31:*.rpm=01;31:*.jar=01;31:*.jpg=01;35:*.jpeg=01;35:*.gif=01;35:*.bmp=01;35:*.pbm=01;35:*.pgm=01;35:*.ppm=01;35:*.tga=01;35:*.xbm=01;35:*.xpm=01;35:*.tif=01;35:*.tiff=01;35:*.png=01;35:*.mov=01;35:*.mpg=01;35:*.mpeg=01;35:*.avi=01;35:*.fli=01;35:*.gl=01;35:*.dl=01;35:*.xcf=01;35:*.xwd=01;35:*.flac=01;35:*.mp3=01;35:*.mpc=01;35:*.ogg=01;35:*.wav=01;35:';
export LS_COLORS

The colors are specified by numbers here, you can experiment to find
ones you like.

You find this color like on your current system by running "dircolors"

Then all you need to do is change the numbers and put it into your
bashrc.  Can go to a system profile if you want, but safer in user
only in .bashrc or such.


If you run dircolors --print-database, among the output one finds this.

# Below are the color init strings for the basic file types. A color init
# string consists of one or more of the following numeric codes:
# Attribute codes:
# 00=none 01=bold 04=underscore 05=blink 07=reverse 08=concealed
# Text color codes:
# 30=black 31=red 32=green 33=yellow 34=blue 35=magenta 36=cyan 37=white
# Background color codes:
# 40=black 41=red 42=green 43=yellow 44=blue 45=magenta 46=cyan 47=white
NORMAL 00 # global default, although everything should be something.

Maybe one of the readers here will help us if we ask the next logical
question.  Suppose We don't like the particular blue used by color 34.
 Can we change from dark blue to Royal Blue, for example.


-- 
Paul E. Johnson
Professor, Political Science
1541 Lilac Lane, Room 504
University of Kansas