Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!think.com!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!bloom-beacon!eru!hagbard!sunic!fuug!tuura!risto
From: risto@tuura.UUCP (Risto Lankinen)
Newsgroups: comp.windows.ms
Subject: Re: Blue and Gray base colors are swapped!
Message-ID: <884@tuura.UUCP>
Date: 17 Dec 90 09:25:19 GMT
References: <1990Dec15.003219.2532@ivucsb.sba.ca.us>
Organization: Nokia Data Systems Oy
Lines: 57

todd@ivucsb.sba.ca.us (Todd Day) writes:

>On one of our machines at work, it appears that someone has
>somehow swapped the blue and gray base colors of Windows.  I
>have played around with just about everything I can think of
>in the Control Panel, but cannot switch it back.  For example,
>in the Control Panel, you can't change the colors of the buttons
>from gray to anything else.  However, somehow, they've ended up
>been done on some lower level than the Control Panel.

Hi!

Some mischievous fellow may have modified the 'non-standard' system colors
in your WIN.INI ...

There are six color descriptions in the WIN.INI, that can't be modified with
the Control Panel.  They are documented in one of the README files that came
with the Windows, though.  I've listed them below with their default values:

[colors]
 . . .
Hilight=0 0 0
HilightText=255 255 255
ButtonText=0 0 0
ButtonShadow=128 128 128
ButtonFace=192 192 192
GrayText=192 192 192

So, check whether your WIN.INI contains above, but with different figures.
If it does, delete them, or change to as shown.  You can also change the
values to whatever suits your taste; an easy way to do it is experimenting
with some other system color in Control Panel, and finally copying the RGB
values from that line to any of six above.

On the other hand, your problem may indeed be hardware-specific, in which
case I would suspect you've got a minorly incompatible VGA<->displaydriver
combination in your system.  Normally, the Windows modifies (if it finds
that many) 20 of the system's palette entries to its own purposes.  *Could
be*, that only 16 colors are modified in your system, leaving four colors
to their hardware defaults, one of which happens to be used for buttons.

If your VGA is 'non-standard', you probably should try to find its specific
driver for Windows (if the problem persisted).

BTW, even with 'normal' VGA, the basic colors will be modified upon Windows
start-up:  For example, the VGA hardware default for bright red is usually 
RGB(100%,50%,50%), while Windows changes it to RGB(100%,0%,0%).  The goal is
to have the system colors as widely apart from each other as possible within
the RGB-cube, to enhance the appearance (and probably simplify calculations)
of the dithered colors.

Terveisin: Risto Lankinen
-- 
Risto Lankinen / product specialist ***************************************
Nokia Data Systems, Technology Dept *  2                              2   *
THIS SPACE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK * 2 -1 is PRIME!  Now working on 2 +1 *
replies: risto@yj.data.nokia.fi     ***************************************