Developer Steve Troughton Smith today tweeted photos of macOS 10.14 with some very juicy details about Apple’s upcoming operating system. The OS is very clearly sporting a fresh new dark theme, presumably a toggle-able setting, with the dark UI affecting all application chrome. You can also see an icon for a Mac News app in the Dock, as well as a first look at Xcode 10.
Smith explains that the API the Mac App Store uses behind-the-scenes is including a video preview for Xcode, something that the current Mac App Store does not support. It represents a pretty big leak on Apple’s part ahead of Monday’s keynote.
Another major leak because Apple just uploaded a video to a place where everyone can find it. Good work, Apple.
As far as dark modes go – I’m generally not a fan, because they often feel like tacked-on afterthoughts, without designers really taking the implications into consideration. The only time where I saw “dark mode” work well was Windows Phone, because that UI was designed for it from the ground-up. Also, dark modes tend to be “dark”, and not black. With today’s modern displays with deep blacks, dark mode should really be black mode.
The dark mode has been standard on Ubuntu for years and any time I’ve installed a new instance of it I’ve changed Ambience to Radiance (the light theme) immediately. I find dark-on-light themes vastly easier to read and easier on my eyes than the opposite. Not sure what the dark theme in MacOS is meant for — video editing, maybe? They look cool until you have to use them for a while.
To each their own.
Why on earth would you want a totally black mode? And why do you care if it feel tacked on? Usually dark mode is for tools you stare at all day, i couldn’t care less if it is pretty or feel polished. I will take a tacked on dark mode for looking at text all day instead of a black text on white background app any day.
This. I absolutely do not want a global type of setting that affects all apps. That is just dumb and misses the entire point of why many developers and media people prefer having their primary apps have optional dark modes. Its about high contrast between the object of their work (source code and video or whatnot) and the tool itself, not about having a dark desktop theme…
Just because I might want xCode to have a dark mode (and I would), that doesn’t mean I want everything else that way too.
I wouldn’t mind if they offer both approaches, but I definitely don’t want them tied together. I can’t even imagine how shitty finder would look in a “dark mode”.
Edited 2018-06-03 01:40 UTC
I don’t get why he hates apple so much. Even finds a way to dock them for a new XCode theme.