On 8/3/11 08:34, Andrew wrote:
On 7/3/11 22:28, Michael Grosberg wrote:
Now here's another issue where your design is problematic: You chose to turn the paint / gradient / pattern selector to a drop-down list, while changing the color mode tabs to a button row. Now, a button row takes a single click to change modes, while a drop-down list takes two. So, obviously, we would like to have the buttons for the more commonly used option, and the drop-down for the less used command. I don't know about you, but I use these buttons ALL THE TIME. As for color mode, I rarely change it at all. To me it makes no sense to give it so much space and skimp on the buttons. It would slow my work considerably. If anything, move the color mode to a drop down. The buttons have to stay.
This is something I worried about as well. I feel that without the labels, the icons are not as useful, and it is not that clear that what they do will affect below. Is using a combobox so hard? In fact it is still one click, hold down and release on the item you wish to select.
Of course if I receive the same feedback from others, I can always modify the mockup to have this changed back. I am not saying it is prefect first time :)
Both drop-down lists (fill type, fill rule) would slow down my workflow as well - I prefer to be able to choose with one click between visible buttons, instead of opening the drop-down to read the each available option and then choose the right one (or to fiddle with the mouse scroll wheel each time, and make sure I get the intended option selected).
Like Michael, switching between color modes happens not as frequently as switching the fill/stroke type, but it's nice to have both settings as quickly accessible (one click) as currently possible. I mainly appreciate to be able to quickly toggle between RGB <-> HSL when exploring different shades of a color.
While the drop-down lists can make a visually "nicer", more compact GUI, usability IMHO is not improved in all cases.
The nested frames and borders in the 'Fill' and 'Stroke paint' tabs have been irritating to me, too - depending on the GTK+ theme used. (I have repeatedly tried to tinker with custom GTK+ theme files to change their appearance - not with much success yet ;) ). OTOH known focus issues with docked dialogs [1] affect (and disrupt) the workflow much more than any visual deficiencies due to nested frames and notebooks, improper padding, or buttons instead of compact drop-down lists. (Personally I'd rather see efforts spent on addressing those first and HIG-ify the dialogs later ;) ).
~suv
[1] focus issues when using docked palettes, e.g. https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/201203 https://bugs.launchpad.net/inkscape/+bug/505225