Obnoxious use of red text in RStudio

Steve Simon

2017-04-07

I really enjoy using RStudio, but one thing about it drives me bats. It seems to use red text for some very innocuous error messages.

Here’s an example. I’m installing a new package, broom, and here’s what I get.

I see no reason why any of the red text deserves such a harsh highlight. When everything fits on the screen, you might be okay with this, but many times, you’ll have a whole sequence of text roll by and when you see a quick flash of red, your first thought is worrying about what might have gone wrong. Nine times out of ten it’s nothing, but you have to scroll through everything just to be sure.

You can find an earlier version of this page on my blog.