I remember the hard task of getting night screens dimmer in the early days PC navigation programs. I was beta testing for one of the (now) big guys out of Seattle. Finally, I asked if they had a closet with no windows, he answered yes and I said go in with a laptop, close the door wait 10 minutes then open it up. Ah came the answer now I understand. Still took a few more releases to get full red scale, not just the chart frame. That was back in the floppy disk days. An early adopter I was. So were a lot of Pilots. I think the Oakland Bridge incident had a lot to do with that.
We all appreciate your effort.
Iām a huge advocate of trying to get ādevelopersā onboard ships/tugs out on the water in real time at night. Let them see first hand all the challenges.
Best way to teach and learn
On Joint Venture before acceptance my brother demanded the LCD bridge PC displays be replaced with special ones because of stray light from the backlighting even when the screen was black. This is something Iāve seldom seen addressed but as a WAFI Iām well aware of it.
Iāve found Rubylith to be a good friend on radar and similar displays, along with internal mods to pilot/panel lighting to bring it down to a tenth of what the mfrs put in. Scribbling on the bulbs with Sharpies can help as well.
Also red nail polish.
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Iāve always tried to stay away from red lighting especially on the chart table. Canāt see the red and magenta markings on the chart.
Better, Iāve found to use white light dimmed down, which my older eyes can see things under.
Magenta is there so you can see it in red lighting. US charts donāt have any red on them, or didnāt when I was using them.
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Well I canāt. Magenta should appear red under red light, but itās nevertheless very hard to see. Dimmed white shows everything clearly.
Maybe itās a sign that you should either swallow the anchor or get glasses.
Or just use white light dimmed with my glasses. I used white light dimmed before I got glasses too, even as a boy ā¦ with saltier, older, old school captains than anybody commenting here!
Seemed to work well. Still does. Always will. Red light isnāt scripture, you know.
Never claimed it was. Just winding you up as you Aussies like to say. 
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I sometimes wonder if there should have been charts printed in Braille.
I always kept a pair of cheap reading glasses in a chart table drawer.
Iāve always been a proponent of dimmed white lite as well. In a pinch I can cup a flashlight and get the required amount of light to see what I need to see in the dark. I think people get fixated on loss of night vision. You know when something is too bright when your pupils are dilated. It hurts your eyes. Warm, dimmed white light in short bursts is not that big a deal and allows you to see every detail of the chart.
Halogen chart light with crossed polarizers worked fine for me for many years after the red one died. But I still like red, even though I am in fact somewhat red-blind ā or a protanomalous trichromat, as the doctors call it. Red LED displays in daylight drive me nuts 'cause I canāt see them.
Now thatās a new phrase I can impress the younger set with!
Iād always relied upon old nautical sounding favourites like āthe obliquity of the eclipticā or ādiurnal inequitudeā.
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