[lnl]

While I am happy that Notepad++ added a dark mode, I am frustrated that Microsoft forced Notepad++ (and all Windows programs) to add hacky workarounds for a dark mode.

Notepad++ already obeys the Windows system colors, and I have been using it in dark mode by changing Windows colors. Microsoft, presumably to sabotage classical programs and to push modern UWP apps, no longer allows changing system colors. There is a Windows 10 Dark Mode instead, and all it does it notify programs about its configuration, so that they redraw all their colors. A vestige of customizable system colors that remains is the (ugly) High Contrast Mode (activated with Alt+Shift+PrtSc); but if one can put up with its ugliness, it works much better than the Windows 10 Dark Mode, changing the theme for all well-written Windows programs, including all versions of Notepad++.

With the UWP mostly dead, I was hoping that they would start caring about "legacy" programs, but nope. Notepad++, as well as many other programs I use and contribute, saw that Windows was not fixing this and started adding their own patchy dark modes, which often don't work that well. I tested the new Notepad++ dark mode, to see maybe I can start using Dark Mode instead of High Contrast Theme. Unsurprisingly, many places (settings, dropdowns etc.) remain with white backgrounds; it is difficult to change all backgrounds as it was written with obeying system colors in mind, rather than manual theming. High Contrast Theme, however, works perfectly. Presumably those remaining white patches will be fixed as Notepad++ has an active community, but dozens of other old Windows programs I use will probably never bother with explicitly adding a dark theme, so I guess I will have to stick with the High Contrast Mode.

[Joeri]

I have a friend who maintains the gui components of a 25 year old windows application suite continuously developed using delphi. The stories he has told me of the epic battles to achieve multimonitor, high dpi, font scaling, theme and dark mode support on a legacy codebase are both impressive and depressing.

It is software like that which keeps windows entrenched in enterprise, but microsoft seemingly cannot be bothered to care.

[MiddleEndian]

Microsoft's Windows strategy is baffling to me. They have gone out of their way to fix a lot of their problems (in fact they fixed almost every single nitpick I had about Windows 7 coming from OS X and Linux), and they add a lot of new powerful features, but at the same time they actively seem to be sabotaging themselves at every step. I really don't know what to make of it.