Default colour of group symbol for new groups deviates from standard colour of group symbol of pre-existing database

[AEgit]

JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-04-08--master--3d2d61d0c
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 1.8.0_201

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Open a pre-existing database and open the groups panel
2. The triangle symbol for all pre-existing groups is grey
3. Add a new subgroup (note that the default colour is set to #FFFFFF
4. The triangle symbol for the subgroup appears in white, i. e. differs from ALL other groups in the database

Is there a particular reason why new groups have a different default colour compared to pre-existing groups? Or is this related to the fact that the original database (incl. groups) was created in JabRef 3.8.2 and when importing the file the default for the groups colour is set to a different colour than the default for creating new groups within JabRef 5.0?

This is just a minor issue, but I wanted to report it, since the behaviour appears not consistent. In fact, when I first encountered this issue, I thought the different colour was meant to emphasize the "Hierarchical context", i. e. "Refine supergroup" and "Include supergroup" groups would appear white, but "Independent group" groups would appear grey (since I only use static "Independent group" groups). Since the creation of "Independent group" groups is now possible again (see: #4783) it is now obvious to me, that this different default colour applies to all newly created groups.

[Siedlerchr]

I could not reproduce it in the current 5.0 dev:
I had an existing db with a group color of turquoise (previously modified by 5.0) or whatever the color is called and opened it in JabRef. The triangle is also the color.

When I then add a new subgroup (default color white) the new subgroup color is also white.

[matthiasgeiger]

When I then add a new subgroup (default color white) the new subgroup color is also white.

This is exactly the problem of @AEgit ;-)

Old groups do not have any color defined, but newly added groups have by default the color white.

[AEgit]

@Siedlerchr
As mentioned by @matthiasgeiger this is the problem I mentioned. Old groups get assigned some default colour (in my case "grey") in JabRef 5.0 (I don't know whether this applies only to groups imported from 3.8.2 or more generally). But when you generate a new group in JabRef 5.0 it won't have the same colour, but the default colour stored in the preferences (in my case "white").

[matthiasgeiger]

I think there are in general two approaches to fix it:

• make the "non-color grey" the default color instead of white
• make the usage of color only an option in the "Create/Edit" group window: Only if activated the set color will be used.

If the grey is specified somewhere in our style information we could simply use this information - if this is somehow OS specific JavaFX standard the second option might be necessary.

... or as a third option: Run a migration as soon as a database without color information for groups is openened (which might affect downwards compatibility - but if I remember it correctly there are already some other breaking changes regarding the groups serialization, right?).

[tobiasdiez]

If no color is specified (e.g. since the group was created before colors were supported) then it is displayed in dark gray.

The problem is that the color selector in the group add/edit dialog does not support a "not set option" and always returns white even if the user didn't select a color. Easiest solution is probably to preselect the dark gray for new groups.

[matthiasgeiger]

Okay... Nonetheless I think that the option to "not having a color" should be possible because using any color will lead to such effects in the maintable:

I assume that it is possible to disable the whole color picker? So I would propose to add an additional checkbox "use specific color" that is triggering the enabled status of the color picker - and if not checked no color should be stored for the group.

[AEgit]

I can confirm that this has been fixed in:
JabRef 5.0-dev--snapshot--2019-09-26--master--1a6c92c79
Windows 10 10.0 amd64
Java 11.0.4-bellsoft