nano-emacs

Emacs nano https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

Yeah it's valid. I have some cognitive limitations that makes it hard to attach meaning to colors so they are mostly distracting for me. So I've gone almost completely in the other way, my theme (based on nano-emacs) uses only one color plus black and grey. It uses typographic distinctions like font weight and style instead. It feels like the last few years there's been some interest in this as an underexplored channel for information in code editors, so (unfortunately for you and good for me) I'd expect to see even more of it in the future. https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

The author is the creator of the nano-emacs package [1], by the way. [1] https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

I think the work Nicolas Rougier has done on "beautifying" Emacs (including org-mode) is about the best that's been done, examples and code: https://github.com/rougier/notebook-mode https://twitter.com/NPRougier/status/1576635498264760325/pho... https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

Both points resonate with me, but I'd push back againt the idea that colored syntax highlighting is neccessary for either. I'm thinking of the Pygments 'bw' theme[1], which denotes strings in italics, and nano-emacs[2], which also manages to do.. a lot with a little (at least aesthetically, ie. idk about code volume or corner cases). 1: https://pygments.org/styles/ 2: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

It's not adhd specific but https://arxiv.org/abs/2008.06030 After reading this I implemented a code theme based primarily around typographic variation like weight rather than color. It uses only two colors (black and deep purple) in two weights and one italic each. I have pretty severe adhd and it's hard to judge but after using it for a few months I think this is better for me. Previously I had been using solarized light for nearly a decade for probably similar reasons. Nano emacs was created by the author of that paper and its default themes are based on it, if you want to try it without committing to hand-rolling a theme. Personally I found that one too "light" (typographically, not color) but I also have relatively poor vision and like a large and heavy font. https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

Without meaning any offense to the OP, I think this is a pretty low bar for Emacs eye-candy... Nicolas Rougier's "Nano Emacs" [0], or his previous "Elegant Emacs" [1] are better examples. You can also get pretty far using variable-pitch mode for mixing fonts (for example in org-mode [2]). [0]: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs [1]: https://github.com/rougier/elegant-emacs [2]: https://github.com/minad/org-modern

I assume you mean https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs#readme

His nano-emacs is one of the cleanest I’ve seen: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs I did a short interview with Nicolas not long ago (very short): https://www.syntopikon.com/workflows/nicolas-rougier/

If level of customizability is your main metric: Emacs can go from this: https://emacshints.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/spash1.png to this: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs

Speaking of gorgeous themes I’m going to boost Mr. Rougier’s excellent work: https://github.com/rougier/nano-emacs. The rest of his portfolio is also well worth a look.