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I am running eclipse on Ubuntu 12.04 and I'd like to change console output color. I tried to edit it via Preferences>Run/Debug>Console>Background color but it doesn't work. Is there some other way to change?

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The Run/Debug>Console menu is correct. But you have to use the "Standard Out/Standard Error text color" buttons. (You can select different colors for standard output and for standard error). Here:

Console text colors in Eclipse

Also see the Eclipse documentation: http://help.eclipse.org/juno/topic/org.eclipse.jdt.doc.user/reference/preferences/run-debug/ref-console.htm

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    as I said, somehow it doesn't work. What I did at the end was create a new custom theme (.css) and running eclipse on it. This helped a lot: stackoverflow.com/questions/2569364/…
    – antifriz
    Dec 14, 2013 at 13:53
  • You said you changed the background color. That wouldn't work :) Dec 15, 2013 at 14:58
  • Hm, I have never seen these options before. How does Eclipse identity an error message in the compiler output? Jun 18, 2015 at 11:43
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    @HelloGoodbye There are normally three "standard" streams that connect a program with its environment: stdin (standard input), stdout (standard output), and stderr (standard error). Also see en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_streams. Java implements these streams in the class System, see the global fields in docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/lang/System.html. In Eclipse, these streams are connected to the console, and the above configuration dialog allows you to select different colors for the different streams. The program itself decides what message goes to which stream. Jun 18, 2015 at 12:57
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    In the case of the output from the compiler to which your question was referring, it's no different. The compiler is also a program. The compiler knows which of its messages is an error message and which message is not, and sends its messages to either stderr or stdout accordingly. Jun 18, 2015 at 13:00
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Window->Preferences=>Build->Console

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I related concept but useful if someone would like full color output on Eclipse's console.

Get an Eclipse extension called ANSI Escape in Console (Link below) https://mihai-nita.net/2013/06/03/eclipse-plugin-ansi-in-console/

The site contains instructions on how to use it. With this plug in you can output in full color to the console by using standard ANSII escape codes for the output of multicolored text and backgrounds on the console. These ANSI escape codes also work if you run your Java programs on the linux command line, but not on the windows command line.

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  • also available in eclipse marketplace
    – dbrank0
    Mar 23, 2020 at 12:46

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