Preference (.plist) files have a black background with black text

Like the title says. It's not causing any trouble apart from being unreadable, just a little annoying.
Any solutions? Is there a plist file that holds information on how other plist files should look?
Oh yeah, this is my other Mac- a G4 with 10.5.8. Everything else works without issues?
Thanks in advance folks.

Hi, Nick - (no rickroll coming), Hi, baltwo -
I remembered seeing this (black on black .plists) mentioned before, dug around and found this topic at macrumors.
Without making you dig through the posts there, the salient point seems to be that this may simply be caused by "using TextEdit to open files that contain binary data/non-standard characters."
Upshot is that in order to edit a .plist file in TextEdit, you first need to convert it from binary to XML. After editing you can convert it back to binary (although it's also claimed that as soon as you change a preference in the related app, the file changes back to binary by itself). Of course, the app shouldn't be running when you edit the property list.
The above topic also contains a link to this Mac OS X Hints post which describes how to convert .plist files in both directions using Terminal.
HTH
Message was edited like 20 times by: Tuttle

Similar Messages

ITunes 11 has black background with black text

I had previously set iTunes to use the dark grid theme. Now I've upgraded to itunes 11 but i'm stuck with cases where I have a black background and black text with no preferences option to fix it. (the same problem I had with the previous itunes version, even when i tried selecting a different theme it wouldn't change)
examples include the downloads window
And views like album view that the text changes color based on the album art, and the background is supposed to too but mine doesn't, so sometimes the icons/text will be unreadable. Like the close, play, shuffle, etc buttons in the screen shot below.
I have tried retinstalling iTunes several times between 10.6 and 11 to fix various bugs but it's never worked properly.
Thanks for any help anyone can provide.

Very Big thank you All of you for your help !!! It's been an hour that I didn't know what to do to see which songs to chooses because of the grey typo on black background !!! Merci
En français : si vous visualisez les chansons d'itunes 11 en gris sur fond noir ou en noir sur fond noir et que itunes 11 est illisible donc, il faut simplement aller dans le terminal et coller cette ligne, cela réinitialisera les paramètres de contrastes d'itunes :
defaults write com.apple.iTunes high-contrast-mode-enable -bool FALSE
Enfin sauvée après une heure de galère à chercher partout comment changer la skin de itunes 11 alors que c'était en fait un bug d'affichage !!!

Black background with white text?

Just installed the trial and am trying to figure out how to get ALL the windows to be black with white text. In prefs I can set the main viewer and filmstrip to black but all others remain gray. I've seen all kinds of screenshots fro Apple so I know it can be done. I did check through the PDF help but didn't see anything there (unless I'm just missing it). TIA.

Hi cbrew,
There are a few options that may be considered here, so I will give brief details of the ones I am thinking could help.
The OS itself may have options that help, and you may as you have tried select to use chosen settings but these simple solutions are often unsatisfactory.
I note [[Accessibility#w_using-a-high-contrast-theme]]#w_using-a-high-contrast-theme says:
Using a High Contrast Theme
Firefox automatically detects if you are using a High Contrast theme and displays everything in your high contrast color scheme. This overrides all other other browser or web page settings, and it affects the Firefox interface itself (all menus, windows, and dialog boxes) and the content of any web page you visit.
That may well be worthwhile trying as an alternative to simply changing font size and colour.
THIS MAYBE THE BEST IDEA<br/>
'''There is a popular add on called No Squint, it takes quite a bit of setting up to work properly but it is very powerful. '''
* https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/nosquint/
* read also support note https://urandom.ca/nosquint/
Additionally it is possible to change settings that includes the Firefox User Interface, it is fiddly, and will probably only be worthwhile if using No Squint. It involves setting the preference ''layout.css.devPixelsPerPx''
*usual values to try from say 1 to 2 or 3; in say 0.2 steps
* and notes on setting procedure http://kb.mozillazine.org/About:config
You may also be interested in
* [[Accessibility]]
* and mainly relating to screen readers an archived article [[Assistive technology compatibility]]
** with discussions [/forums/knowledge-base-articles/707737 1] , [/kb/Assistive technology compatibility/discuss/1996 2] and another archived article [[Firefox 3 with Screen Readers FAQ]]
* http://accessfirefox.org/

Change menus to black background and white text (not invert colors option)?

I have an iPhone 5 on the way to me as I got one for a very good price. I am visually impaired. I currently have a Samsung Galaxy s3 which is crapping out on me after having it for a long time). One of the features I love about it is, the menus (settings, contacts, etc etc) are in high contrast (black background with white text, which is much easier on my eyes and easier to read. It is my understandiing that the iPhone is not the same way. I had a friend look on his, and the only option he found was the "Invert colors" option. The reason I don't want to use that is because it inverts ALL colors for everything on the phone, including pictures. t just want to invert the colors in all the menus so I can read them easier. Is there any way to do this? BTW it's running IOS 8.

the invert colors option is the only way to achieve that on iPhone currently
you should go to http://www.apple.com/feedback/ and request that feature added, I think a lot of people would use that

Some PDF Files Shown with Black Background and White Text - Annoying

Hi All,
Recently some of my pdf documents, stored on my phone, are displayed with a black background and white text. This is quite annoying. A few weeks ago I didn't have this problem. All of my pdf documents had a white background with black text.
I'm a new iPhone user without much experience with the device. I have the 4.3 version of the software and update when prompted. I use Files Pro, FileApp Pro and QuickOffice applications in conjunction with DiskAid.
If there is something I can do to correct the situation, please let me know. If the problem is with Apple, they need to fix the situation. My phone, which used to be a great device for storing documents, has turned into an annoying bug.
Thanks,
Mike

Hello imcpa2!
Try taking a look at this thread for possible solutions:
http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Printer-All-in-One-Install-Setup/laserjet-1536-dnf-fax-pdf-printing-pro...
Hope this helps!
Help the community by marking this post as a solution if it solved your issue!.
If my post helped you in any way, please click the blue KUDOS star under my name! It would mean a great deal.

Why are my PDFs black background with white lettering?

I cannot remember how to undo something. My pdfs are black background with white lettering. I just want it back to normal

Hi pistoley,
Are you viewing your PDFs in Reader or Acrobat, and what version? It sounds like there may have been a change made to the Accessibility preferences. In Reader/Acrobat XI, choose Edit > Preferences (Windows) or Reader/Acrobat preferences (Mac OS), and click the Accessibility category. Is Replace Document Colors selected? If so, try deselecting that.
Please let us know how it goes.
Best,
Sara

PDFs printing with black background and white text.

For some reason some of our PDF's have been printing with black backgrounds and white text, even though they appear to be normal on the screen before they are printed. I haven't been able to confirm 100% yet but it appears to only be happening with pdfs that were created from scanned documents.
Can somebody please offer me some suggestions.

Absolutely agree with the original poster. I find white text on black background so very very difficult (I changed from using Tweetbot on iOS to Tweetlogix for this very reason) and it physically hurts my eyes to try to read it. I can just about manage with Spotify using white text on a black background on the large screen of my MacBook Pro - and I do mean "just" - but for the smaller screen of my iPhone 5 it is just impossible. Even with a retina screen such as that on the iPhone 5S there is a strange ghosting effect and it gives me a headache to look at it for too long.
This may be something to do with age! I suspect most app developers are youngsters with almost perfect eyesight, but for those of us whose eyesight is less than perfect, this white text on black background really is so very difficult.
I know there is a workaround in setting the iPhone to invert ALL colours (under Accessibility in Settings) but it's a real pain to have to keep altering this setting every time I want to open or close Spotify, and it doesn't look right anyway. iOS7 is supposed to be a light, bright, easy to read OS - sadly this new Spotify app is the opposite of that.
Please would Spotify consider adding a simple light or dark theme option, so that those of us who want it can have our much easier to read light background back again, with grey or black text? It would be a great help to those of us who have eyesight problems.
If not, I may have to cancel my Spotify Premium account and move to Deezer instead, as I mainly use Spotify when out and about in the car, so am using the iOS app a lot.
Thank you for considering this plea!

My mac book pro will not fully boot up. I have the grey background with the apple sign and the timer going round...but 20 minutes later still no desktop

My mac book pro will not fully boot up. I have the grey background with the apple sign and the timer going round...but 20 minutes later still no desktop

You could try doing a hard shut down (holding the power button or yanking the battery) and then doing a safe boot by holding the shift key at startup:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1455
Also, not sure if this applies in your case, but I've had that happen when there's a USB drive inserted either in the computer or a connected external keyboard. I did a hard shut down, removed the drive and it went through a normal start up.

How do I get a white background with black lines

How do I get a white background with black lines and characters on my screen. To run the program, copy it out and delete the ` and it should go. If it does not compile on your machine, I would like to know. There is a test on about line 34 for changing the colors.
`//Simple program to test Graphics2D.setBackground(white) obtained from BufferedImage.getGraphics()
`import java.awt.Frame; //Object>awt.Component>Container>Window>Frame
`import java.awt.Insets; //Object>awt.Insets
`import java.awt.image.BufferedImage; //Object>awt.Image>awt.image.BufferedImage
`import java.awt.Graphics; //Object>awt.Graphics
`import java.awt.Graphics2D; //Object>awt.Graphics>Graphics2D
`import java.awt.Color;
`import java.awt.BasicStroke;
`public class TstBgCol { //frame & BufferedImage in pixels & BasicStroke in points ????????????
` TstBgCol tstBgCol;
` public static void main(String[] args) {
` TstBgCol tstBgCol=new TstBgCol(); tstBgCol.tstBgCol=tstBgCol;
` tstBgCol.main2(); tstBgCol.byteBinary();
` }
` Graphics fgcontext;
` Frame fram; Insets insets; //borders of the Frame, Container.getInsets
` int bIWid=1272,bIHgt=876; //set for 1280x1024 screen on windows XP & matches paper ratio 10.6x7.3
` int unusedPixHgt=84;
` void main2() {
` fram=new Frame();
` fram.addWindowListener(new java.awt.event.WindowAdapter() { //anonymous inner class
` public void windowClosing(java.awt.event.WindowEvent e) { System.exit(0); }
` });
` fram.setVisible(true);
` insets=fram.getInsets(); //(Container)getInsets() works after displayable
` System.out.println("Insets l,t,r,b:"+insets.left+","+insets.top+","+insets.right+","+insets.bottom);
` fram.setSize(insets.left+bIWid+insets.right,insets.top+bIHgt+unusedPixHgt+insets.bottom);
` fgcontext=fram.getGraphics(); //creates Graphics context for this component
` }
` void byteBinary() {
` BufferedImage buIm=new BufferedImage(bIWid,bIHgt,BufferedImage.TYPE_BYTE_BINARY); //can be resized
` Graphics2D bIG2=buIm.createGraphics(); //returns Graphics2D context
` //change to if(true) to use either of the following two lines
` if(false) bIG2.setBackground(Color.white); //does not change the background color to white
` if(false) bIG2.setColor(Color.black); //does change the foreground color to black
` edgeLinesAndX(buIm,bIG2);
` fgcontext.drawImage(buIm,insets.left,insets.top,fram);
` }
` private void edgeLinesAndX(BufferedImage bI,Graphics2D bIG2) { //really on the edge
`      BasicStroke strk=new BasicStroke(10f); bIG2.setStroke(strk);
` int x0,y0,xmx,ymx;
` x0=bI.getMinX(); y0=bI.getMinY(); xmx=bI.getWidth()-1; ymx=bI.getHeight()-1;
` bIG2.drawLine(x0+xmx,y0,x0,y0+ymx); //lo-left to up-right
` bIG2.drawLine(x0,y0,x0+xmx,y0+ymx); //up-left to lo-right
` bIG2.drawLine(x0,y0,x0+xmx,y0); //up-left to up-right
` bIG2.drawLine(x0,y0,x0,y0+ymx); //up-left to lo-left
` bIG2.drawLine(x0,y0+ymx,x0+xmx,y0+ymx); //lo-left to lo-right
` bIG2.drawLine(x0+xmx,y0,x0+xmx,y0+ymx); //up-right to lo-right
` bIG2.drawString("("+x0+","+y0+") wid="+(xmx+1)+" hgt="+(ymx+1),(xmx+1)/5,(ymx+1)/5);
` }
`} //the result on my screen is a black background, why?????

How do I get a white background with black lines and characters on
my screen.Contrary to what you might think, the linebIG2.setBackground(Color.white);does not give the buffered image a white background. The API docs
http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5.0/docs/api/java/awt/Graphics2D.html#setBackground(java.awt.Color)
say: "Setting the background color in the Graphics2D context only
affects the subsequent clearRect calls... " So adding a line to your
if blocks we getif (false) {
    bIG2.setBackground(Color.white);
    bIG2.clearRect(0, 0, buIm.getWidth(), buIm.getHeight());
if (false) {
    bIG2.setColor(Color.black);
}Changing the false to true results in a white background (and black
X and text).

Mail page now black background with white print and I cannot fix.

Today when I signed on, my mail page is now black background with white letters and I cannot figure out how to change it back to what was there before -- black on white -- and cannot find anything in help on this problem.

Some web pages give the user the option on page styles. For the rest of
them,<BR><BR>
Go to the
'''''[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/ Mozilla Add-ons Web Page]'''''
(There’s a lot of good stuff here)
and check out
'''''[https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/nosquint/?src=external-Add-ons_Manager_Context_Menu-extension NoSquint]'''''.
This add-on can override web page setting to give you control.

My iphone was stuck up with the black background with apple logo.what willl i do to open my phone?

my iphone was stuck up with the black background with apple logo.for 24 hrs. until now i can't open my phone what wil i do?

If it isn't recognized in iTunes see: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1538 (windows) or http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1591 (mac).

My lockscreen did not showing me time and it lags, help PLS! it´s only black background with unlock button and it lags when i unlocking it pls help

My lockscreen did not showing me time and it lags, help PLS!
it´s only black background with unlock button and it lags when i unlocking it
pls help

It's not an Apple issue and Apple has nothing to do with it.
The only way to buy an iPhone officially refurbished by Apple is to buy it from an Apple store or via Apple's website.
Refurbished iPhones sold via other retailers are not refurbished by Apple.
Sounds like Wireless Wave did all they could... they refunded your money.
Your only issue is with them. Stop getting all worked up over it.

Black Screen with white text at startup (??)

Hello All:
I have a 2010 15" MacBook Pro, just got it in June. Had to send it in for a logic board replacement and now have it back. Everything works great except now instead of having the standard Apple greyish startup screen, I have a black screen with white text that scrolls through all of the startup stuff. I figure they changed some line on a plist somewhere so they could watch the startup and make sure everything was OK, then forgot to change it back.
Although I know it is good to know what's going on under the hood, I would rather it started up the regular way. Anyone know how to switch it back? I would call Apple, but would rather not sit on the phone for a long time for what I believe is probably a very simple fix. I did a search but couldn't find my problem listed....
Thanks everyone...

Kappy:
Thanks for the reply. I looked at the plist, but the -v was not there. Here is a copy of the plist:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
<key>Kernel Flags</key>
<string></string>
</dict>
</plist>
At least I know what it is called now - a "verbose startup".
Again, thanks for the help. Learn something new every day.

After installing Yosemite my fax is sending black pages with white text

I used to send faxes with my Panasonic KX-MB2020 using Prewiew program. With Mavericks faxes were good. After installing Yosemite, my recepients started to tell that they get "negatives" - black pages with white text. Fax machine is ok - if I print a documet and then send it to the same recepient without my notebook, it goes well.
Please check this bug.

Furthermore, before now, my Panasonic easily scanned documents directly, with pressing "Scan" button on the machine. Now this operation is impossible - I have to launch Printer properties on my Mac, and from this window I have to start scanning.

Macbook Pro boot shows black screen with white text cursor

Hello,
I have a MacBook Pro 7,1 MC374xx/A running Mavericks. My box has two internal hard drives in it. One had the Mac OS installed to it, and the other has absolutely nothing on it. I decided to give Boot Camp Assistant a try and chose the hard drive with nothing on it to install Windows on. I also had an external USB DVD drive attached with the Windows 7 installation disc on it.
So, next thing ya know, my Mac reboots and loads a black screen that says "Memory Overload." I take out the external USB drive and restart. Then it said, "No boot devices found." Now for whatever reason, it's just a black screen with a white text cursor.
What the heck happened?
I selected command R and confirmed that I installed Boot Camp on the right hard drive (the drive that did not contain my Mac OS). Then, I completely erased everything from the drive with Boot Camp on it. But still..black screen with white text cursor.
I have no Time Machine backups available so I'm forced to reinstall the OS. Any idea why this happened? It seems I must have attempted to install Boot Camp improperly. Any ideas or instructions on what to do now or how to install Boot Camp successfully on the Macbook Pro I own?
Earnestly,
Speck

Boot Camp- Windows installation boots to black screen with blinking cursor.

Preference (.plist) files have a black background with black text

Similar Messages

Maybe you are looking for