A color code is a system for displaying information by using different colors.
The earliest examples of color codes in use are for long-distance communication by use of flags, as in semaphore communication.[1] The United Kingdom adopted a color code scheme for such communication wherein red signified danger and white signified safety, with other colors having similar assignments of meaning.
As chemistry and other technologies advanced, it became expedient to use coloration as a signal for telling apart things that would otherwise be confusingly similar, such as wiring in electrical and electronic devices, and pharmaceutical pills.
The use of color codes has been extended to abstractions, such as the Homeland Security Advisory System color code in the United States. Similarly, hospital emergency codes often incorporate colors (such as the widely used "Code Blue" indicating a cardiac arrest), although they may also include numbers, and may not conform to a uniform standard.
Color codes do present some potential problems. On forms and signage, the use of color can distract from black and white text.[2] They are often difficult for color blind and blind people to interpret, and even for those with normal color vision, use of many colors to code many variables can lead to use of confusingly similar colors.[2]
Examples
Systems incorporating color-coding include:
- In electricity:
- 25-pair color code – telecommunications wiring
- Audio connectors
- Video connectors
- Optical fibers
- Electrical wiring – AC power phase, neutral, and grounding wires
- Electronic color code AKA resistor or EIA color code (today - IEC 60062:2016 )
- Ethernet twisted-pair wiring – local area networks
- Jumper cables used to jump-start a vehicle
- PC99 connectors and ports
- Surround sound ports and cables
- Three-phase electric power (electrical wiring)
- In video games
- Health and magic points
- To distinguish friend from foe, for instance in StarCraft, Halo, or League of Legends
- To distinguish rarity or quality of items in adventure and role-playing games[3]
- In navigation:
- Other technology:
- At point of sale (especially for packaging within a huge range of products: to quickly differentiate variants, brands, categories)
- Bottled gases
- Fire extinguishers
- Kerbside collection
- Pipe marking
- Queen bee birth year code
- Underground utility location
- In military use:
- Artillery shells and other munitions, which are color-coded according to their pyrotechnic contents
- List of Rainbow Codes
- NATO Military Symbols for Land Based Systems
- Rainbow Herbicides
- In social functions:
- Black hat hacking, white hat, grey hat
- Blue-collar worker, white-collar worker, pink-collar worker, grey-collar, green-collar worker
- Handkerchief code
- ISO 22324, Guidelines for color-coded alerts in public warning
- Cooper's Color Code of the combat mindset
- Rank in Judo
- Ribbon colors see: Category:Ribbon symbolism
- In religion:
See also
References
- ^ Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers: Volume 29 (1893), p. 507.
- ^ a b See, e.g., Michael Richard Cohen, Medication Errors (2007), p. 119.
- ^ "Color-Coded Loot". Giant Bomb. Retrieved 13 June 2016.
External links
Media related to Color code at Wikimedia Commons
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This page was last edited on 21 October 2023, at 18:33