Absolute beginner question for programmers/coders. Black background, green/red text?

Question

What is the black background when you code? For instance matlab looks like a white texteditor, how do people program with green and red text on black background?

I have 0 experience with programming. I have heard it helps some code faster this way, or just makes it more appealing.

So far from what I've seen on youtube, a lot of python is done in (terminal?) on mac OS and it kind of looks like that. Also maybe it has to do with text editor?

Are there coding software (matlab, python) like that for windows?

Say a mechanical engineer student is starting out on first ever programming software and would like to work in that font

Answer 1

You are indeed probably thinking of a terminal window, possibly running on Linux.



I think you should start by focusing more on learning how to program than the color and font of your software utilities. I would actually recommend you look for a good IDE (integrated development environment). Eclipse is really good and supports many languages.



Note that I personally like to edit files on the fly in vi (complicated yet efficient text editor) from a shell, but when you want a more global view of your project, an IDE is preferable.



If you want to become a car mechanic, you study how a car works, not how big garages are setup and decorated. The same goes for programming. Once you start to get your hands in it, if something annoys you, look for an alternative.

Answer 2

Selection of foreground and background colors used by your terminal windows is a matter of personal preference.

Sometimes I use different color combinations when working with remote systems to help me keep track of which system each window is connected to.



I suspect that the black background and white/green font color, is left over from trying to emulate the old glass CRT terminals, from 35 years ago. Most of the early ones had either black or dark green backgrounds with white font color. Also the standard size for most of them was 80 columns by 24 lines, which is also the default size of most terminal windows.



So it appears to be a left over from early implementations which were emulating the old CRT terminals.

Answer 3

You can configure the background and forground colors on pretty much any decent text editor/IDE. I personally work black on white, but I know a lot of programmers prefer white (or another color) on black.