Compose styles
Rather than blending styles toward a middle, this gives them roles. The first one carries the structure, the next comes in as the accent, and anything after that shows up in a single detail. Where they fight each other, it says so before you start.
How to divide the work
- Composition
- Follow Acme: Split the screen into columns and stack windows inside them. Each window is a one line tag above a body. Take no margin, and separate neighbours with a single thin rule
- Type
- Set in Acme's manner (One typeface, one size. No bold and no coloured text; state is shown by an underline and by inverted selection only), and let Terminal UI's lettering (One monospaced face where emphasis comes from weight and inversion alone) appear only where you want the eye to catch.
- Material
- Ground in Acme's material (Two ground colours only: pale yellow for the body, pale blue for the tag, black for the text. Underline execution in dark red and reference in dark green, and fill the centre of the small square at the left of the tag when the file has been modified); bring in exactly one thing from Terminal UI (One phosphor hue on black with scanlines and bloom added sparingly).
- Colour
- Build on #FFFFEA, #EAFFFF, #AA0000 and admit one accent from #b2b2b2, #00a800, #010301.
Where they fight
These are already listed as related entries, so the join should come easily.
Caution
- Acme Copy the look and turn the tag into a fixed menu, and you lose the actual mechanism, which is that any string at all can be a command.
- Terminal UI Heavy scanlines and flicker cost legibility and the atmosphere ends up beating the speed that made the tool worth using.
Image prompt
Produce four original images that take their structure from Acme (style, 1994–) and their accent from Terminal UI (style, 1970s–). ## What to make Make the kind of thing Acme exists for: when a working screen should stop gaining widgets and let every place you can type hold a command, or when a development environment is meant to be extended by users typing commands into the tag themselves. Choose one subject and hold it across all four. ## Structure comes from Acme - Windows are stacked in columns, and each window is just a one line tag above a body - The scroll bar sits at the left edge of the body, and nothing sits at the right - Sweeping a string with the middle button underlines it only while the button is held - The body is pale yellow and the tag pale blue, and there is not one button or icon to click Composition: Split the screen into columns and stack windows inside them. Each window is a one line tag above a body. Take no margin, and separate neighbours with a single thin rule. Type and lettering: One typeface, one size. No bold and no coloured text; state is shown by an underline and by inverted selection only. ## Accent comes from Terminal UI, used sparingly - Single phosphor color on black - The monospace grid - A blinking cursor - Scanlines and glow Let one material quality come from it: One phosphor hue on black with scanlines and bloom added sparingly. ## Colour and feeling Build the ground on #FFFFEA, carry the structure in #EAFFFF and #AA0000, and let a single accent come from #00a800. These are read off real works, so a direction rather than a fixed palette. Feeling to carry: technique, calm, rebellion. ## What goes wrong - Acme: Copy the look and turn the tag into a fixed menu, and you lose the actual mechanism, which is that any string at all can be a command. - Terminal UI: Heavy scanlines and flicker cost legibility and the atmosphere ends up beating the speed that made the tool worth using. ## Across the four Keep the roles fixed in all four. Vary the framing, the scale and the arrangement so the set shows what this pairing can do rather than four versions of one picture. ## Constraints - Do not imitate, reference or name any specific artist, studio, brand, character or copyrighted work. - Do not reproduce the composition of an existing work. - Produce original compositions in the general period languages described above.
Related entries
- Acme 1994– / Style / Platform Screen Languages
Acme is the interface Rob Pike described in a 1994 paper, a hybrid of window system, shell and editor. It has no icons and no pop-up or pull-down menus; any string anywhere on screen can be executed with the middle button or opened with the right one. Windows are stacked in columns, and each is only a one line tag above a body.
- Terminal UI 1970s– / Style / UI Expression
The terminal look: monospaced phosphor characters on black. The VT100's green afterglow became the primal image of the computer's face, repeated from hacker cinema to modern CLI tools.
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