Terminaux 1.x - Manual
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🎨Color Sequences

We need colors!

This feature is available on 1.0.0 or higher.

Terminaux provides a functionality to generate color sequences with the help of the VT sequences. It allows you to generate a color with three modes:

  • 16 colors

  • 256 colors

  • 16-bit colors (true color)

Please note that some consoles don't support 256 colors and/or 16-bit colors, and some of them might implement these poorly (Terminal.app (Apple_Terminal) for example).

Support for 16-bit colors and 256-colors requires a compatible terminal emulator.

  • Windows systems: ConEmu, Windows 10 cmd.exe with VT sequences enabled

  • Linux systems: xterm, GNOME Terminal, Konsole, etc.

  • macOS systems: iTerm2 only

This functionality contains several functions that you can make use of in your console application:

  • Building a Color instance that supports RGB and 255-color modes

  • Getting console color information from the 255-color mode

  • Simulating color-blindness during compilation

Building a Color instance

You can build your own Color instance for usage in your console application. There are various ways to build it:

public Color(int R, int G, int B)
public Color(ConsoleColors ColorDef)
public Color(ConsoleColor ColorDef)
public Color(int ColorNum)
public Color(string ColorSpecifier)

The ColorSpecifier can be of the syntax:

  • <num>

    • <num> should be of the range between 0 and 255

  • <rrr>;<ggg>;<bbb>

    • <rrr>, <ggg>, and <bbb> should be of the range between 0 and 255

  • cmyk:<ccc>;<mmm>;<yyy>;<kkk>

    • <ccc>, <mmm>, <yyy>, and <kkk> should be of the range between 0 and 100

  • cmy:<ccc>;<mmm>;<yyy>

    • <ccc>, <mmm>, and <yyy> should be of the range between 0 and 100

  • hsl:<hhh>;<sss>;<lll>

    • <hhh> should be of the range between 0 and 360 in degrees and not radians

    • <sss> and <lll> should be of the range between 0 and 100

  • hsv:<hhh>;<sss>;<vvv>

    • <hhh> should be of the range between 0 and 360 in degrees and not radians

    • <sss> and <vvv> should be of the range between 0 and 100

  • ryb:<rrr>;<yyy>;<bbb>

    • <rrr>, <yyy>, and <bbb> should be of the range between 0 and 255, just like RGB.

  • #000000

    • Hexadecimal representation of the color for HTML fans

  • <ColorName>

    • Color name from ConsoleColors enumeration

You can also specify just a string, an integer, a ConsoleColor, or a ConsoleColor enumeration value when making a variable that holds the Color class like the following:

Color ColorInstance = 18;
Color ColorInstance = "94;0;63";
Color ColorInstance = "#0F0F0F";
Color ColorInstance = "Magenta";
Color ColorInstance = ConsoleColors.Magenta;
Color ColorInstance = ConsoleColor.Magenta;

Additionally, you can choose whether to use your terminal emulator's color palette or to use the real colors that come from the true colors. By default, Terminaux chooses to use the terminal emulator's color palette to maintain consistency.

In addition to the PlainSequence property, you can also use the ToString() function to get the same value from that property. This allows easier string interpolation, such as:

BoxFrameTextColor.WriteBoxFrame($"Red, Green, and Blue: {selectedColor}", hueBarX, rgbRampBarY, boxWidth, boxHeight + 2);

Getting console color information

You can get detailed information about the console color ranging from 0 to 255 by making a new instance of the ConsoleColorsInfo class:

public ConsoleColorsInfo(ConsoleColors ColorValue)

Simulating color-blindness

This feature is not available in the Rust port of ColorSeq.

In the ColorTools static class, it contains several color blindness simulation tools that you can use:

  • EnableColorTransformation

    • Enables the color transformation to adjust to color blindness upon making a new instance of color

  • EnableSimpleColorTransformation

    • Enables the simple color transformation. This changes formula from Brettel 1997 (value is false) to Vienot 1999 (value is true)

  • ColorDeficiency

    • Specifies the type of color blindness (Protan, Deutan, Tritan, and Monochromacy)

  • ColorDeficiencySeverity

    • Specifies the severity of the color deficiency ranging between 0.0 and 1.0 from lowest to highest

Both the severity and the simple color transformation formula flags don't affect the monochromacy color transformer, which is available starting from 1.10.0.

After you change these values, the next time you make a new instance of Color, you'll notice that the resulting color is shifted to adjust to color-blindness.

Starting from 1.9.0, you can easily make a new Color instance using the brand new API function, RenderColorBlindnessAware().

Translate from X11 to ConsoleColor and back

ConsoleColor enumeration has an order of colors that is slightly different from the X11 colormap definitions for the first 16 colors. The following colors differ from each other:

ConsoleColorX11

ConsoleColor.DarkBlue

ConsoleColors.DarkRed

ConsoleColor.DarkCyan

ConsoleColors.DarkYellow

ConsoleColor.DarkRed

ConsoleColors.DarkBlue

ConsoleColor.DarkYellow

ConsoleColors.DarkCyan

ConsoleColor.Blue

ConsoleColors.Red

ConsoleColor.Cyan

ConsoleColors.Yellow

ConsoleColor.Red

ConsoleColors.Blue

ConsoleColor.Yellow

ConsoleColors.Cyan

In the ColorTools class, you can find two functions that translate between the two color mappings:

  • If you want to translate from ConsoleColor to X11's representation (ConsoleColors), use the TranslateToX11ColorMap() function, provided that its signature is: 

    public static ConsoleColors TranslateToX11ColorMap(ConsoleColor color)

  • If you want to translate from ConsoleColors to .NET's representation (ConsoleColor), use the TranslateToStandardColorMap() function, provided that its signature is: 

    public static ConsoleColor TranslateToStandardColorMap(ConsoleColors color)

Correcting the ConsoleColor map for X11

Terminaux also provides a function that gets the correct color mapping for the specified color. The function is found under ColorTools, called CorrectStandardColor(). The signature is defined below:

public static ConsoleColor CorrectStandardColor(ConsoleColor color)

Resetting the colors and the console

Since 1.3.0, Terminaux provides a console extension that allows you to perform a hard reset using the two VT sequences. When invoked, the terminal will perform two resets:

  • Full reset (ESC sequence)

  • Soft reset (CSI sequence)

After the reset is done, the screen will be cleared with all the colors reverted to their initial state. The signature is defined below:

public static void ResetAll()

Conversions of Color Models

In addition to Terminaux supporting RGB color model, you can also use the CMYK and other color models when creating the color instances, provided that their specifiers that you must use are: (for quick reference)

  • CMYK's specifier is cmyk:ccc;mmm;yyy;kkk

  • CMY's specifier is cmy:ccc;mmm;yyy

  • HSL's specifier is hsl:hhh;sss;lll

  • HSV's specifier is hsv:hhh;sss;vvv

  • RYB's specifier is ryb:rrr;yyy;bbb

To convert from RGB to CMYK or to any other color model, you need an instance of the Color class first with the color of your choice. Afterwards, you can use the RGB property of the Color class to obtain conversion functions, which are:

  • ConvertToCmyk()

  • ConvertToHsl()

  • ConvertToCmy()

  • ConvertToHsv()

  • ConvertToRyb()

The conversion is done to their separate classes that are appropriate for the following color models:

CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black Key)

This color model contains two separate classes: the Cyan Magenta Yellow class, and the wrapper class with the black key value.

  • CyanMagentaYellow

    • This is the class that stores the Cyan, the Magenta, and the Yellow values in both the fractional and the whole formats.

  • CyanMagentaYellowKey

    • This is the class that is a wrapper of the CyanMagentaYellow class along with the black key in both the fractional and the whole formats.

To convert from CMYK to other color models, you can use the following functions:

  • ConvertToRgb()

  • ConvertToHsl()

  • ConvertToCmy()

  • ConvertToHsv()

  • ConvertToRyb()

CMY (Cyan, Magenta, and Yellow)

This color model contains a single color model class that contains the necessary variables to represent the cyan color level, the magenta color level, and the yellow color level.

To convert from CMY to other color models, you can use the following functions:

  • ConvertToRgb()

  • ConvertToCmyk()

  • ConvertToHsl()

  • ConvertToHsv()

  • ConvertToRyb()

HSL (Hue, Saturation, and Luminance (Lightness))

This color model contains a single color model class that contains the necessary variables to represent the color hue, the color saturation, and the color luminance (or lightness).

To convert from HSL to other color models, you can use the following functions:

  • ConvertToRgb()

  • ConvertToCmyk()

  • ConvertToCmy()

  • ConvertToHsv()

  • ConvertToRyb()

HSV (Hue, Saturation, and Value)

This color model contains a single color model class that contains the necessary variables to represent the color hue, the color saturation, and the color value.

To convert from HSV to other color models, you can use the following functions:

  • ConvertToRgb()

  • ConvertToCmyk()

  • ConvertToCmy()

  • ConvertToHsl()

  • ConvertToRyb()

RYB (Red, Yellow, and Blue)

This color model contains three variables that represent the red, the yellow, and the blue color levels ranging from 0 to 255.

To convert from RYB to other color models, you can use the following functions:

  • ConvertToRgb()

  • ConvertToCmyk()

  • ConvertToCmy()

  • ConvertToHsl()

  • ConvertToHsv()

Resetting colors

This feature is available in 1.9.0 or higher.

You can reset all the colors once you're done writing text with color using the ResetColors() method.