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SGUI 5.0 Preview, Icons, Tester
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toralf

Joined: 31 Jan 2005
Posts: 3841
Location: Bremen, Germany

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 10:02 am Post subject:

Chris wrote:

- Toolbar's tooltips take a little longer to appear than I'd expect.

It is after 1 second. Do the other testers feel the same? Should it be made a shorter period?

Chris wrote:

- It's a slightly counterintuitive not to start off with a blank canvas when starting the program (i.e. you have to create a blank GUI first).

Changed in next release

Chris wrote:

- After anchoring a control on the form, the resize mode does not work for me. I have to drop the control then resize it with the little grab-points.

This is a bit different then the old SGUI. Here you have to click and drag. The click drops the control on the gui, then you have to drag (with the left mouse button down) to resize the control. All drag directions are possible. Could you please re-test?

Chris wrote:

- It would be nice if the toolbar visually indicates the currently-selected control type.

Like a toggle button? How would you like it to indicate?

Chris wrote:

- The abilility to add new controls stops working after doing certain things (I'm not sure what exactly -- perhaps adding a Tab control).

New controls do not get added, if during click and release after drag the mouse is outside of the gui. Maybe the controls you added were too wide, so that their right bootom corner was outside of the gui. So when you clicked and released immediatly the control got deleted. Please test if that is the case. I can add controls without limitation.

Chris wrote:

- Some of the up-downs on the bottom toolbar are horizontal rather than vertical.

That is correct, this is because for e.g. "width" it was irretation to have an updown control vertically. I think it is more intuitive to have it horizontally.

Chris wrote:

- It's strange not to have a right-click context menu (maybe one is planned). Almost every GUI wizard and drawing program I've used has one. I prefer it because it's object-oriented and requires less screen-searching and memorization than toolbars and menus (reducing the learning curve).

This is planed for the future.

I like to introduce three very important features: Control list, Refresh and Properties.

- Control list: A toolwindow with the list of controls of the current gui can be opened with a icon in the upper toolbar. In this toolwindow the name of the gui can be changed. Also the order of the controls can be changed. This is very important, e.g. to have certain controls on certain tab pages. Also a toggle icon "add control above" can be activated, that adds new controls above the currently selected control. Otherwise new controls get added at the end of the list.

- Refresh: If you want to update the visual representation of the gui to reflect the new order of controls (or if the grips hide behind other controls, e.g. a tab) you can press the refresh icon (in that toolwindow or in the bottom toolbar). It will rebuild the gui. This is very helpful when you want to populate different tab pages with controls, since after such a refresh the controls are sorted onto their tab pages.

- Properties: From the control list toolwindow an icon opens the properties toolwindow. In this toolwindow the properties of the gui ore the selected control can be changed. Some properties take immediate effect. E.g. please tra the "text" property. E.g. for a tab control it adds/removes/renames the tab pages.

Have fun to explore the functionalities. :)
_________________
Ciao
toralf

majkinetor

Joined: 24 May 2006
Posts: 3644
Location: Belgrade

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 12:00 pm Post subject:

Where can I donwload test version ? Sorry if i misssed something... _________________

toralf

Joined: 31 Jan 2005
Posts: 3841
Location: Bremen, Germany

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 12:16 pm Post subject:

There is currently no public download. I have chosen some alpha testers. When it will be a beta I will make it public. If you want to seriously test and help, let me know. _________________ Ciao toralf

Chris
Site Admin

Joined: 02 Mar 2004
Posts: 10474

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 12:17 pm Post subject:

toralf wrote:

Chris wrote:

- After anchoring a control on the form, the resize mode does not work for me. I have to drop the control then resize it with the little grab-points.

Yes that works. It seems a bit strange that after anchoring the control, the mouse cursor moves automatically to the lower-right corner, implying that resize mode is in effect immediately (instead, you have to click). It could be just my experience with the old SGUI; but if not, maybe it's more distracting than it's worth to have the mouse move automatically.

Quote:

Chris wrote:

- It would be nice if the toolbar visually indicates the currently-selected control type.

Like a toggle button? How would you like it to indicate?

Perhaps invert its colors or give it a sunken appearance to indicate that it's the currently "active" toolbar button (might not be so easy). Someone had a fancy toolbar app somewhere in the Scripts forum that used some kind of highlighting to indicate a selected button (hover effect). In any case, I think all of this should be a low priority (it was only an observation).

toralf wrote:

I can add controls without limitation.

I can't reproduce it; but I wouldn't worry about it because if in fact it really is a problem, it will surely be reported by others as testing continues.

Quote:

Chris wrote:

- Some of the up-downs on the bottom toolbar are horizontal rather than vertical.

That is correct, this is because for e.g. "width" it was irretation to have an updown control vertically. I think it is more intuitive to have it horizontally.

I see your point. Two small drawbacks to this are that it deviates from traditional interface practices and makes the buttons more difficult to click (since they're so narrow).

Quote:

I like to introduce three very important features: Control list, Refresh and Properties.

Sounds useful.

Overall, you've done a good job keeping the interface simple. I think complex interfaces discourage people from using a new GUI program because first impressions and learning curve are vital. In keeping with this, I think rarely-used features should be hidden from view (such as put into a submenu on the menu bar or a popup menu). Also, I think the number of toolbars and their buttons should be kept to a minimum, or at least made optional (which you have done).

Finally, I'm not fond of toolbar-centric apps because of the amount of screen clutter they cause. Therefore, I think that a right-click interface should not be an afterthought or extra feature. For me, it is the primary interface for modifying, moving, and resizing controls -- especially if it allows dozens of toolbar buttons and/or menu-bar items to be eliminated or hidden-by-default.

Thanks for listening.

majkinetor

Joined: 24 May 2006
Posts: 3644
Location: Belgrade

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 12:19 pm Post subject:

Ok, You know now. Send me the link on the mail. With the source. _________________

toralf

Joined: 31 Jan 2005
Posts: 3841
Location: Bremen, Germany

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 1:52 pm Post subject:

Chris wrote:

Quote:

I like to introduce three very important features: Control list, Refresh and Properties.

Sounds useful.

Just to make it clear: these features are not planed, they are already there!

Chris wrote:

I'm not fond of toolbar-centric apps[...]. Therefore, I think that a right-click interface should not be an afterthought or extra feature.

For me it is just the opposite. Thus, context menu will be a feature for later or for others to code. Now that most of the visual placement/modification of controls is available ** I'll concentrate on core internal features first (e.g. save as project/file, set properties).

** some of the existing features:
- position and size new controls with click and drag
- select controls with left mouse click
- multi select with Shift+LButton or with click and drag of a selection frame
- drag grips to position or resize controls (single and multi selection)
- snap to grid
- selection (single and multi) works in control list too
- controls (single and multi) can be moved up and down in list
- new controls can be inserted in the list above a selected control
- controls can be placed on tab pages (needs a manual refresh)
- several properties for guis and controls can be set and some apply immediatly
- supports all AHK controls
_________________
Ciao
toralf

toralf

Joined: 31 Jan 2005
Posts: 3841
Location: Bremen, Germany

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 5:41 pm Post subject:

Next release will have:

Quote:

- added: when "snap to grid" is active: pressing Shift sets snap to 2 pixel, pressing Ctrl sets snap to 5 pixel, default is 10 pixel
- changed: indicate which control is currently getting added by setting control sunken
- changed: at start an empty new gui is shown
- changed: when new control doesn't get added to gui (e.g. click somewhere else) mouse is not moved for resize
- changed: multi select also works in gui when Ctrl is pressed
- fixed: resizing controls with active "snap to grid" (thanks Rajat)

_________________
Ciao
toralf

Rajat

Joined: 28 Mar 2004
Posts: 1718

Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2006 8:04 pm Post subject:

i also like the rt. click menu for control's properties alteration... maybe you could use the code from old SGUI. _________________

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