I don't see the problem with Xubuntu 18.04.

This was one of the things that changed with wx313.  James, which Linux distro/version are you using?

I am using Ubuntu 18.04.04
The about box reports I was still building with wx 3.1.1

wx-config --query-version returned 3.1, which was 'not very helpful'.

I then went and built wx 3.1.3, and installed it.

wx-config --version-full now reports 3.1.3.0
wx-config --selected-config reports gtk2-unicode-3.1
The CMake configure script reports finding 3.1.3.

I rebuilt Audacity, and the about box reports I am building with wx 3.1.3
I'm still getting grey backgrounds behind the numbers.

DEVEL - FIX MADE
https://github.com/audacity/audacity/commit/4267ba0490f35bebedb6a1b79ba711d087d8d4f6

(In reply to James Crook from comment #4)
I'm not seeing the rectangular backgrounds, but when the High Contrast theme is used this is much worse now than before because there is very little contrast between the green numbers and the green meter bar.

Previously with the High Contrast theme, the numbers has a black background, which was admittedly quite ugly, but was easy to see.

(In reply to Steve Daulton from comment #5)

The hard to read numbers are logged as a new P4 Bug #2483

>Meter numbers in High Contrast Theme hard to read during Record/Play

I'm not happy to sign this one off because:

1. I am not able to reproduce the reported issue. If I revert the fix and rebuild according to the current build instructions, I don't see the problem.

2. The proposed fix creates bug 2483.
If I revert the fix for 2473, it fixes bug 2483.

(In reply to Steve Daulton from comment #7)
I'm reopening this bug so that we can find out why James is seeing the bug but apparently no-one else is seeing it.

Steve - whether numbers had a transparent or opaque background was essentially random, i.e. would vary for different machines - because previously it was not set either transparent or opaque.  I think the fix will be to detect if the number colour is similar to the green, and use a background if it is similar, otherwise transparent.

(In reply to James Crook from comment #9)
I see that wx3.1.3 makes it quite easy to compare luminance of colours: https://docs.wxwidgets.org/trunk/classwx_colour.html#ab26df3bfab77f5a3c54e9caff93c78f8

Might be a good idea to get some screenshots that demonstration the problem the commit is fixing and the problem the fix has caused. Like Steve, I just don't see the issue with the fix removed.

Is this really a P2 bug ?

I SEE IT!!!!  I SEE IT!!!!  Had to install 18.04, though I could swear I tried it before back when this first appeared.

Created attachment 1085 [details]
What James was seeing

"Fix" in:

https://github.com/audacity/audacity/commit/cd35976

Okay, so what this has attempted to do is make the meter text in the 2 "darker" themes easier to see. James fix was needed (at least on Ubuntu), so I tried to come up with an easy compromise.

All it does is reduces the brightness of the meter bars (using Steve's GetLuminance() idea) to allow the themed text to pop out a bit more.  That "themed" is important since changing the text color would "violate" the theme.  Adding meter bar colors to the theme would be nice in that you could have colors that fit a given theme better.  But, then you lose the "green is good/yellow is caution/red is a no-no" idea.

Thus, the compromise.

I'll be posting screenshots to -quality for comment.

Looks OK here, but I couldn't reproduce the original bug.

Thanks Leland.

Yes bug 2483 (contrast issue in hi-contrast theme) is fixed.
I confirm that the fix does not unfix this bug, bug 2473!

RESOLVED FIXED

MacOS Build 0f58e8. Much improved for High Contrast. It's acceptable in all themes IMO.