Base16 color schemes¶

Introduction ¶

I spend a lot of my computer time in front of a Debian GNU/Linux box in a tmux session with multiple windows and panes (opened in an xterm), editing text files with Vim or just doing command line work in Bash.

I’m using the Base16 theming system and appreciate that it makes it possible to keep tmux and all my panes (with or without Vim opened in them) synchronized with regard to the colors. I just have to issue a single command (like base16_classic-dark) in one of the panes to switch the color scheme everywhere.

Cloning Base16 repositories locally ¶

Just issue some git clone commands (as a normal user) in specific subdirectories of your home directory:

cd ~/.config
git clone https://github.com/tinted-theming/base16-shell.git
cd ~/.vim
git clone https://github.com/tinted-theming/base16-vim.git
cd ~/.tmux/plugins
git clone https://github.com/tinted-theming/base16-tmux.git

Configuration ¶

Enable 256 colors in terminals ¶

Make sure you have the following line in your ~/.Xresources:

XTerm*termName: xterm-256color

Have the color scheme applied on Bash startup ¶

You need to tweak your ~/.bashrc file to have the color scheme applied on Bash startup. I didn’t exactly follow the recommendations in the README of base16-shell. Instead I added the following snippet to my ~/.bashrc:

BASE16_SHELL_PATH=$HOME/.config/base16-shell/

unset BASE16_THEME

! shopt -q login_shell || [ -n “$TMUX” ]

&& [ -s “$BASE16_SHELL_PATH/profile_helper.sh” ] 
&& BASE16_SHELL_SET_BACKGROUND=false 
&& source “$BASE16_SHELL_PATH/profile_helper.sh”

It makes sure that the color scheme is applied only when you’re in a terminal or in a tmux session, not when you’re in a login shell in a text console.

The BASE16_SHELL_SET_BACKGROUND=false causes the background color of the color scheme to be ignored. Without that, I find that most of the dark schemes have a background color that is not black enough. The downside is that the light schemes are pretty much unusable, but I wouldn’t use them anyway…

Have the color scheme applied in Vim ¶

First I created the ~/.vim/colors symbolic link with ~/.vim/base16-vim/colors as the target:

cd ~/.vim
ln -s base16-vim/colors

Then I added the following snippet to my ~/.vimrc:

if exists(‘$BASE16_THEME’)

&& (!exists(‘g:colors_name’)
|| g:colors_name != ‘base16-$BASE16_THEME’)

let base16colorspace=256

if !has(“gui_running”)

let base16_background_transparent=1

endif

colorscheme base16-$BASE16_THEME

endif

This is what is recommended in the README of base16-shell, except for the base16_background_transparent=1 part that I had to add for the same reason as I added BASE16_SHELL_SET_BACKGROUND=false above. The !has("gui_running") condition ensures the the transparent background option is applied only in “terminal” Vim and not in graphical Vim (gvim). In gvim, the transparent background option leads to a white background.

Have the color scheme applied in tmux ¶

The Base16 theming system seems to work well with the following lines at the top of the ~/.tmux/conf file:

# Use a 256 color terminal.
set -g default-terminal “tmux-256color”

# Useful if using base16-shell.
set -g allow-passthrough 1

# Add base16-tmux plugin to the list of TPM (Tmux Plugin Manager) plugins.
set -g @plugin ‘tinted-theming/base16-tmux’

Choosing a color scheme ¶

There are more than 260 Base16 color schemes, so you’re spoilt for choice!

You can see the list of the base16 schemes with this command:

alias | grep "^alias base16_"|sed "s/=.\+$//"|sed "s/^.\+ //"

The Base16 Gallery helps to make a choice.

Alternatively, you can cycle through all the schemes with the following commands (3 seconds delay before switching to the next scheme):

ALL_SCHEMES=$(alias|grep "^alias base16_"|sed 's/^[^"]\+"\([^"]\+\)".*$/\1/')
for S in $ALL_SCHEMES; do sleep 3; echo "$S"; set_theme "$S"; done

If you want to exclude the schemes with “-light” in their name, do:

ALL_SCHEMES=$(alias|grep "^alias base16_"|sed 's/^[^"]\+"\([^"]\+\)".*$/\1/')
ALL_NON_LIGHT_SCHEMES=$(echo $ALL_SCHEMES | tr " " "\n" | grep -v "\-light")
for S in $ALL_NON_LIGHT_SCHEMES; do sleep 3; echo "$S"; set_theme "$S"; done

Finally, to cycle through my favorite dark schemes, use:

for S in \
    3024 \
    atelier-plateau \
    atlas \
    brewer \
    circus \
    codeschool \
    darcula \
    darktooth \
    embers \
    everforest \
    grayscale-dark \
    irblack \
    kanagawa \
    ocean \
    papercolor-dark \
    paraiso \
    phd \
    pico \
    primer-dark-dimmed \
    sandcastle \
    solarflare \
    standardized-dark \
    summercamp \
    twilight \
    vulcan \
    ; do sleep 3; echo "$S"; set_theme "$S"; done