That's awesome Brynn, such detailed comments, we can use your knowledge of Inkscape during the process. Like you said, it's a stage to stage implementation and we can address the issues you had mentioned in the stages when we are actually implementing that part of the new design.

Also I don't know if you had a chance to read my emails, I have been constantly mentioning that 85-90% of the UI/functions are there and the rest "ARE MISSING" and I have also mentioned that it can be accommodated gracefully in the same UI.

I don't know how it works and I don't know if there is someone who has to approve the features or a change like this into Inkscape.

I would like some help on how to take this further from here.

Cheers

Amarneethi

On Sun, Mar 6, 2016 at 9:09 AM, Brynn <brynn@...3133...> wrote:

if this is just for Linux and/or Mac, I shouldn't really make any
comments,
since I'm a Windows user.

All best,
brynn

Since it sounds like this is an overall ui design, I'll make some more comments.

1 - I think these are some big changes which cannot happen all at once. Maybe if they are implemented in stages, like each time there's a new version release, some more changes are added, it might work.

2 - I would like to see this as an option, and not forced on users. Personally I don't like white on black (or dark gray) themes. And I have not seen anywhere (screenshots from other users, since I only use Windows at present) any 2-tone ui or icon sets that I like. As I mentioned before, I have very few complaints with the current interface. Although....

This is a big "although". I would really, really, really like to see some way for Inkscape to have interchangeable themes, or sometimes I've seen called "skins", which can be changed easily from Inks Prefs; and in such a way that anyone could create their own personal theme, or create themes that they can share with the community.

Since I don't like the 2-tone ui in the first place, I'm not sure if it would be fair for me to make further comments.... Well, at least not about the icons' appearance, but I could make some comments that don't relate to the 2-tone nature of the interface.
____________

1 - Re your image, toolbox_names.jpg

I would not be in favor of the Gradient tool being hidden under the Paint tool. Imo, the Paint Bucket tool is more of a raster feature that's made to work for Inkscape. So it should not hide the Gradient tool. I use the Gradient tool by faaarr more often than PB. Actually it doesn't make sense to me to have them grouped at all, even if PB was hidden under Gradient tool.

Let's see, we currently have 20 tools, that you've somehow condensed down to 9. I'm not sure exactly which tools you consider a shape tool. (Rect, Ell, Star, Spiral, and maybe 3D Box?) So 9 plus 4 = 13. And then 1 more for hidden Gradient is 14.

Missing are Selection, Connector, Dropper, Eraser, Measure, and Zoom

I guess maybe you're having Zoom controlled from the bottom of the window? But where are the other 5 tools?

How do you decide which dialogs/panels will appear in the toolbox? What about Filters Editor? (I keep forgetting to make wishlist for a button for Filters Editor, to go in command bar with F/S, Text, Layers, etc.) And there are others that might work there as well.

The Layers icon looks too much like a New Document, New File, or maybe even a Pages icon. I haven't found your version of the New File icon yet, to be able to compare.

Align dialog icon needs a 3rd bar, to be more clear what it is. What happened to Distribute?

The Node tool icon needs to have at least 1 node in it.

The Transform Panel icon doesn't give me any indication what it's for. Without the text, I'd be confused. It could be the Node tool or a Fill tool, or even a shape tool.

Also I don't get the Paint tool icon, whatever it is. Imo, the bucket is a better symbol.

What happened to the Selection tool?

2 - Re your image, panels.png

For Text panel, why is there a color option? Can't we just use the color palette (or panel) to change text color?

For Transform panel, where do you choose units?

For Align panel, what happened to Distribute options? Are they in a separate panel?

For Layers panel, the little eye that opens and closes is classic. I suspect there would be constant complaints about the diamond shape for show/hide. Also, I'm not sure if you're showing all locked or all unlocked layers. (The current lock/unlock icons are also classic.)

I could take or leave having the palettes in a panel. It's one of those "if it isn't broken, don't fix it" things, imo. What are those 2 icons in top-right corner -- a dashed line and a solid line. Is that how you choose a different palette?

3 - Re inkscapeUI_v07.jpg

Whoa!! What happened to the status bar??!

I see that you put the Style Indicator section of the status bar in the....I'm guessing that's the Selection tool control bar. (Although I still haven't found the Selection tool icon yet.) What happens if you're using a different tool? Is the Style Indicator permantently in the control bar?

What happened to the Layer Indicator? I can see where maybe it's not needed, especially if the Layers dialog is open. But it's very convenient if Layers dialog is not open.

But MUCH more importantly, where's the Notification Area? In my opinion, the notification area is the single most important part of the interface!!

I see a whole LOT of blank space between the white rectangle and the toolbox on the left and dialog buttons on the right. From an image further down the page, it looks like the space on the right is where the dialogs open. But is that just wasted space on the left? And there's blank space above and below the white rectangle too. Where does the canvas start? Are there features that will use this space? Why not fill it up with more canvas space?
____________

Ok, those are all my comments :-)

All best,
brynn

___________________________________
From: Amarneethi R
Sent: Saturday, March 05, 2016 4:57 AM
To: inkscape-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
Subject: Re: [Inkscape-devel] User-Interface design for Inkscape

Hi All,

First thanks to Sebastian, Brynn and others for their comments, suggestions and kind words.
I will try to summarize the thought process behind the redesign.

The main thought process behind the new interface design for inkscape was to make it more organized and user-friendly than just a theme change. For example, right now the "Text and Font panel" (Ctrl+Shift+T) has three different tabs which is unnecessary in my opinion, if you look at the new text panel it covers almost all of the functionalities in all the three panels put together. There are a few functionalities in the panel which I don't understand, so I thought I can get an understanding from you guys when we actually implement it in development. As I have mentioned in my original mail, the missing functionalities can still be accommodated gracefully without sacrificing the visual appeal.

I had a conversation in the IRC channel with a inkscape user whether we should adapt the new icons and theme right away. Any product development change takes time and is done in phases, so we can look at re-organizing the panels with the existing iconography in phase one but some controls might have to be changed. We can take the same Text Panel as an example, the font chooser can be a "dropdown" instead of a "scrolling list" as the user will be able to see a consistent number of fonts whether a single panel is docked or multiple panels are docked. Right now if I have more than one panel docked, I'm not able to see more than five fonts and the scrolling becomes more painful. Another example is whenever I choose a font it doesn't reflect on the selected text item, I have to press "apply" button every time which is not very intuitive for the end-user, at least I should be able to apply when I double click on the font name in the current control, if it is dropdown it should apply the chosen font on the selected text.

These are my observations as a windows Inkscape user and just one example of the entire thought process. Having said all this I'm not sure of the limitations in terms of technology/framework. But I'm sure we can find elegant controls/solutions with GTK itself as I can already see those controls in the current design itself, but for different actions/functions. For example, instead of putting the "superscript", "subscript" in the variants tab and under an accordion we can use a similar control as the "left","right","center" alignment icons and put them under font tab, which is easier for the users to access than being hidden in another tab and under an accordion. :)

Once we are done with the re-organization of the tools and panels, we can look at switching the theme which I assume is a matter of changing the icon images or something similar.

Like Sebastian has mentioned UX is more than just a skin change and I think Inkscape can benefit from a UX overhaul.

Best
Amarneethi

On Sat, Mar 5, 2016 at 4:43 PM, Jabiertxo Arraiza Cenoz <jabier.arraiza@...2893...> wrote:

Maybe Im on the bad way but I love all GTK widgets changed to HTML
widgets, so changin style is more easy and independent to programing
layer.

Is this posible or is a cracy thing?
Cheers, Jabier.

El sáb, 05-03-2016 a las 04:05 -0700, Brynn escribió:

I'll be glad to make some comments, simply as an Inkscape user. I'm
not a
developer.

I see that you must have put a lot of thought and long hours of work
into
this. And congratulation for that!

How did you decide what changes to make? Is it all just your own
personal
preference?

I think it would be very interesting, and very helpful, if someone
(or a
team) who wanted to make a new interface, would do some polling, to
find out
what changes are wanted/needed by the greater community as a
whole. In my
opinion, that's the kind of change in the interface which has the
best
chance of being adopted and used by the project. Although
personally, for
the most part, I'm happy with the current interface.

Or is this only for the Linux system, where it's my understanding
it's
easier to change the interface theme? If you intend this to be an
overall
interface change, for all systems, I could make some comments for
you. But
if this is just for Linux and/or Mac, I shouldn't really make any
comments,
since I'm a Windows user.

All best,
brynn

____________________________________
From: Amarneethi R
Sent: Friday, March 04, 2016 10:00 PM
To: inkscape-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
Subject: [Inkscape-devel] User-Interface design for Inkscape

Hi Guys,

I have been working on a new user-interface for Inkscape, you can
find the
design in the link below.
I'm a fan of open source softwares and been using them for over 5
years now
and wanted to give back to the open source community.
Let me know what you guys think. :)

http://artntechasone.com/forInkscapeTeam.html

Thanks
Amarneethi

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Best Regards
Amarneethi
Never care for things they say!
Never care for games they play!!
Life is ours we live it our way...
Cos nothing else matters..!

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Best Regards

Amarneethi

Never care for things they say!

Never care for games they play!!

Life is ours we live it our way...

Cos nothing else matters..!