On 2010-09-09 12:54, J.B.C.Engelen@...1578... wrote:
... (about tool cursor with color preview) Pretty neat! Could you also implement this for the spiral, pen(cil) and calligraphy tools?
Sure. The main reason I didn't do it yet is that it isn't clear to me what should be shown. Other than that it's just a matter of changing the corresponding .xpm and adding a small line with tool's "preference url" to its TOOL-context.cpp (in the init function, see rect-context.cpp for example, if you want to do it yourself).
On Thu, Sep 9, 2010 at 10:32 PM, Jasper van de Gronde < th.v.d.gronde@...528...> wrote:
On 2010-09-09 12:54, J.B.C.Engelen@...1578... wrote:
... (about tool cursor with color preview) Pretty neat! Could you also implement this for the spiral, pen(cil) and calligraphy tools?
Sure. The main reason I didn't do it yet is that it isn't clear to me what should be shown. Other than that it's just a matter of changing the corresponding .xpm and adding a small line with tool's "preference url" to its TOOL-context.cpp (in the init function, see rect-context.cpp for example, if you want to do it yourself).
Hi everyone! Jasper, I have just tried a build with the implemented cursor-color indicator. Nice work! ;) Considering Mr. Engelen's question, how about this? (please check out the attachment)
xpm can support transparency, but not levels of transparency, if I am not mistaken. Before, I was goofing around with the GIMP UI and replaced the tool icons and cursors in with SVG files. And those icons looked really cool and smooth! ;) So, I wanted to ask... or suggest... Can we do the same in Inkscape and use svg instead xpm? While still using the tool-cursor-color indicators, of course ;)...
On 2010-09-10 17:29, Aleksandar Kovac wrote:
... Hi everyone! Jasper, I have just tried a build with the implemented cursor-color indicator. Nice work! ;) Considering Mr. Engelen's question, how about this? (please check out the attachment)
We have both stroke and fill, would it be okay in these cases to only display the stroke?
xpm can support transparency, but not levels of transparency, if I am not mistaken.
Basically we've rolled our own xpm, so we can do what we like. And even with the current color indicators it already uses an alpha channel.
Before, I was goofing around with the GIMP UI and replaced the tool icons and cursors in with SVG files. And those icons looked really cool and smooth! ;) So, I wanted to ask... or suggest... Can we do the same in Inkscape and use svg instead xpm? While still using the tool-cursor-color indicators, of course ;)...
Hmm... My personal feeling would be that I want my cursor to really be as barebones as possible and while previewing the color can be useful, letting the full power of svg loose on our cursors seems like a bad idea. Even now I purposefully opted to just only support for painting with fill and stroke, and not all colors of the rainbow.
Thanks again for replying!
> We have both stroke and fill, would it be okay in these cases to only > display the stroke?
I would agree that the stroke is what matters with these tools, but maybe that would not be fair to the user or the abilities of these tools, I think. I am sending a roughly updated sketch. Opinions?
> Basically we've rolled our own xpm, so we can do what we like. And even > with the current color indicators it already uses an alpha channel.
Great! Thanks for the info.
> So, I wanted to ask... or suggest... Can we do the same in Inkscape and > use svg instead xpm? While still using the tool-cursor-color indicators, > of course ;)...
> Hmm... My personal feeling would be that I want my cursor to really be > as barebones as possible and while previewing the color can be useful, > letting the full power of svg loose on our cursors seems like a bad > idea. Even now I purposefully opted to just only support for painting > with fill and stroke, and not all colors of the rainbow.
The rainbow! :) Hehehe! As soon as I read it, a 'Rainbow Tool' went thru my head! Exactly what we always needed! :) LOL! Just kidding! Just kidding.
But seriously, thank you very much for your explanation! The reason I asked about SVG is to see if some of the user-interaction-scenarios I have done before in my research, could be implemented in Inkscape. Most of those have solid research data to support them as useful and effective, and I was thinking, why not ask? :) So, how to put that 'SVG' power to a good purpose? Besides the colors and bling you mentioned ;) (I am afraid I am not skilled with the 'bling' at all). So far, I have managed to filter just a few simple examples. They are very, very rudimentary, but I would like to know if any of you think it could be useful, and of course, your own ideas… thanks in advance!
-Inkscape Accessibility. Some of us can't see as good as others can. Using vectors, we can provide an ability to scale the cursor so that people with 'not-perfect-sight' can be happier with the Inkscape, enjoy and be creative! Scalable cursors and tool icons, might not be a huge bump in the accessibility, but would be a good and friendly step forward.
-Icons with deeper meaning. What we did with the introduction of the color on the cursor is simply telling the user what's the color at the time of use. This approach could be even smarter. a) For example, imagine that you look at the *toolbar* and see: that all the shape icons have red fill and black stroke. That gives the user 2 advantages: 1. to know in advance the color of the shapes. 2. to streamline workflow a little based on that knowledge. e.g. purposefully clicking first on the palette to change the fill color to green… Already existing functions in Inkscape provide a lot of choices to implement with the icons. Of course, a good survey would show which ones are really good, if any. ;)
b) Dynamic tool icon For example, a tool cursor icon, that changes appearance depending on the Tablet pressure, angle, speed or inclination. This would be nice for some, don't you agree?
-Even more 'bareboney' cursors ;) Human perception tests show, that a small, high contrast, pixelated image demands more attention than smoother, antialiased one. Antialiased is also more (better?) readable than a jagged one. In practice, comparing 2 icons of the same size, one jagged and one AAliased, the AAliased one seems to work better. …
there. Not sure if SVG is necessary for any of these. If you have any comment, please tell me. Thank you. Alex
..now about that 'rainbow tool' ;)...
On 2010-09-11 16:05, Aleksandar Kovac wrote:
So, I wanted to ask... or suggest... Can we do the same in Inkscape and use svg instead xpm? While still using the tool-cursor-color indicators, of course ;)...
Hmm... My personal feeling would be that I want my cursor to really be as barebones as possible and while previewing the color can be useful, letting the full power of svg loose on our cursors seems like a bad idea. Even now I purposefully opted to just only support for painting with fill and stroke, and not all colors of the rainbow.
... But seriously, thank you very much for your explanation! The reason I asked about SVG is to see if some of the user-interaction-scenarios I have done before in my research, could be implemented in Inkscape. Most of those have solid research data to support them as useful and effective, and I was thinking, why not ask? :) So, how to put that 'SVG' power to a good purpose? Besides the colors and bling you mentioned ;) (I am afraid I am not skilled with the 'bling' at all). So far, I have managed to filter just a few simple examples. They are very, very rudimentary, but I would like to know if any of you think it could be useful, and of course, your own ideas… thanks in advance!
-Inkscape Accessibility. Some of us can't see as good as others can. Using vectors, we can provide an ability to scale the cursor so that people with 'not-perfect-sight' can be happier with the Inkscape, enjoy and be creative! Scalable cursors and tool icons, might not be a huge bump in the accessibility, but would be a good and friendly step forward.
I guess this could be interesting, especially if we ever have to support a high resolution display. (Which is not entirely beyond the realm of possibilities.) It should be doable, and we could generate the crosshairs in Inkscape (so they wouldn't be part of the SVG) to make absolutely sure they come out as crisp as possible (ideally we would put something in the svg to make sure this is okay, but still).
You may want to make a bug report (or rather feature request in this case) at bugs.launchpad.net to make sure it's not forgotten.
-Icons with deeper meaning. What we did with the introduction of the color on the cursor is simply telling the user what's the color at the time of use. This approach could be even smarter. a) For example, imagine that you look at the *toolbar* and see: that all the shape icons have red fill and black stroke. That gives the user 2 advantages:
- to know in advance the color of the shapes.
- to streamline workflow a little based on that knowledge. e.g.
purposefully clicking first on the palette to change the fill color to green… Already existing functions in Inkscape provide a lot of choices to implement with the icons. Of course, a good survey would show which ones are really good, if any. ;)
Hmm... Not entirely sure this wouldn't be going slightly too far as visibility can suffer from this feature, and while this is not a huge problem for the cursor (you just selected the tool anyway, and you can see it being selected in the toolbar) it might be a problem for the toolbar.
b) Dynamic tool icon For example, a tool cursor icon, that changes appearance depending on the Tablet pressure, angle, speed or inclination. This would be nice for some, don't you agree?
Can't say I've ever used a tablet, so I wouldn't know, but I'll take your word for it.
-Even more 'bareboney' cursors ;) Human perception tests show, that a small, high contrast, pixelated image demands more attention than smoother, antialiased one. Antialiased is also more (better?) readable than a jagged one. In practice, comparing 2 icons of the same size, one jagged and one AAliased, the AAliased one seems to work better. …
So basically you're suggesting that an antialiased cursor would be better than a non-antialiased one? If desired it wouldn't be too hard to implement that even now, especially if it's just to evaluate it.
On 9/11/10, Aleksandar Kovac wrote:
-Inkscape Accessibility. Some of us can't see as good as others can. Using vectors, we can provide an ability to scale the cursor so that people with 'not-perfect-sight' can be happier with the Inkscape, enjoy and be creative! Scalable cursors and tool icons, might not be a huge bump in the accessibility, but would be a good and friendly step forward.
Exactly how will it help? Okay, we have a larger cursor and larger tool icons. And then what? :) Is content magnified as well? :) Whereas modern desktops already provide rasterized (admittedly) scaling of the whole desktop for free.
-Icons with deeper meaning. What we did with the introduction of the color on the cursor is simply telling the user what's the color at the time of use. This approach could be even smarter. a) For example, imagine that you look at the *toolbar* and see: that all the shape icons have red fill and black stroke. That gives the user 2 advantages:
- to know in advance the color of the shapes.
Are you sure that users won't screw their heads off after dealing with toolbars that change all the time? :) It's an interesting idea though.
b) Dynamic tool icon For example, a tool cursor icon, that changes appearance depending on the Tablet pressure, angle, speed or inclination. This would be nice for some, don't you agree?
How exactly would it look?
-Even more 'bareboney' cursors ;) Human perception tests show, that a small, high contrast, pixelated image demands more attention than smoother, antialiased one.
URL?
Alexandre Prokoudine http://libregraphicsworld.org
ME: > Human perception tests show, that a small, high contrast, pixelated image > demands more attention than smoother, antialiased one.
ALEXANDRE: > URL?
Hi, and sorry for the delay. A little busy at the moment. Now, about those tool cursor icons... The display density is getting higher, and this jagged-vs-smooth issue will be obsolete. On those cool smartphones with crazy pixel density a single pixel is so small that all 'the 'jaggies' are gone + all the contrast preserved. That's great! The technology finally caught up with our eyes. ;) Even then, we will need a better way of displaying the icons or they'll shrink together with the pixel size. Yes, we could use bigger pixels for conservatives out there, :) but scalable cursor icons seem more sensible. And somehow svg popped up as an option… The current bitmapped tool cursor icons served great so far. I don't want to sound as I would like them removed, but to suggest an update.
As for the URL Alexandre asked for, well, I feel silly sending this, and not some killer-website that would give you an exact answer. But, please if you have some time, give it a read. ;) I have prepared the links for you, and some reasons, I think, support scalable tool cursors.
1. "Choosing Binary or Grayscale Bitmaps: some Consequences for Users" (Alison Black, Andrew Boag) On an example of typeface recognition (not readability!), this paper shows that binary bitmaps are less effective. link: opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/bingrey.pdf
2. "A Psychophysical Approach to Assessing the Quality of Antialiased Images" (James A. Ferwerda, Donald P. Greenberg from Cornell Uni) Some experiments on the benefits of antialiasing, especially when the image is moving. link: opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/aaimages.pdf
3. "Spatial-frequency tuning of visual contour integration" (S. C. Dakin and R. F. Hess) A paper on how problems of contour recognition and integration. Based more on the hard-wiring of the brain. link: opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/contourintegration.pdf
*If you somehow get interested in this stuff, a book 'Psychophysics: A Practical Introduction ' by Prins and Kingdom, is a good starter.
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecological_validity_%28perception%29, perception theory... In short, The brain recognizes images better if they display more of the characteristics of the real object. Since a blocky, jagged edged pencils are not what brain is used to seeing in the nature, such a pixelated image of a pencil has to be processed more by the brain to 'connect-the-dots' and figure out 'Oh it's a pencil!'. Of course, when creating an image of a pencil we should carefully balance the realism with purpose and function.
5. Inkscape already displays AA graphics and has AA icons in the toolbar. I believe the reasons for this are the same. Also there an entry in Inkscape Wiki stating 'scalable icons' as one of the design goals. http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Icons
6. Personal experience. I have prepared a small and clumsy rendition of the pencil tool cursor for illustration. I admit, it's not doing justice to the bitmap icon, but I hope it's ok. link: opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/bitmap-vector comparision.svg
Cheers,
I will try to provide answers for other questions you asked me, too.
Alex
...Sorry for the space in the last link to svg! Alex
Hi, I am reviving an old thread, but I feel I 'owe' some answers here ;).
On Sun, Sep 12, 2010 at 10:24 AM, Alexandre Prokoudine < alexandre.prokoudine@...400...> wrote:
On 9/11/10, Aleksandar Kovac wrote:
-Inkscape Accessibility. Some of us can't see as good as others can. Using vectors, we can provide
an
ability to scale the cursor so that people with 'not-perfect-sight' can
be
happier with the Inkscape, enjoy and be creative! Scalable cursors and
tool
icons, might not be a huge bump in the accessibility, but would be a good and friendly step forward.
Exactly how will it help? Okay, we have a larger cursor and larger tool icons. And then what? :) Is content magnified as well? :) Whereas modern desktops already provide rasterized (admittedly) scaling of the whole desktop for free.
:) I have a feeling you never tried that scaling function. Try sometimes and see how long you can do it before getting sick. :) Scaling kills proper spatial perception of the screen limits and objects on the screen, leading to inability to properly correct cursor position on the screen, leading to ... well, getting lost on the screen. Even reading, that demands simple eye-tracking, in many cases takes double the time. ( http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.3.795) No, zoom function is not a solution.
And... Nope, the content is not magnified. :)) ...for that we use Inkscape's zoom tool which, the people with less than perfect sight, would access easier. Kidding aside, icon scaling can go both ways, some people like icons small.
-Icons with deeper meaning. What we did with the introduction of the color on the cursor is simply telling the user what's the color at the time of use. This approach could
be
even smarter. a) For example, imagine that you look at the *toolbar* and see: that all
the
shape icons have red fill and black stroke. That gives the user 2 advantages:
- to know in advance the color of the shapes.
Are you sure that users won't screw their heads off after dealing with toolbars that change all the time? :) It's an interesting idea though.
…Like that MS Office horror menu thing that use to hide the commands from users? Whatta fun! Yikes!
I'm not *sure* this will work without testing in working conditions. But, I *think* this would work : When a person sees: a brush with green track, and a pencil with orange track. People immediately figure out what's going to happen if you use it. A green brush stroke, and an orange pencil stroke.
When using natural media, tools are more complex than GUI metaphors. e.g.: colored pencils, crayons, ... A lot of tools that come in many variations. In the case of the colored pencils, not only the color is changed and the shape stays the same, but there are many of the objects, too! Sounds like a recipe for confusion, yet somehow it does not confuse the brain too much. As I said, I think this will work based on experience, but without the testing, nothing's for sure ;). ... Anyone interested? Should I try to make a sketch?
b) Dynamic tool icon For example, a tool cursor icon, that changes appearance depending on the Tablet pressure, angle, speed or inclination. This would be nice for
some,
don't you agree?
How exactly would it look?
Not sure 100% how it would look, but there is a sketch you can download, and we can start from there. http://opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/Inkscape-dynamic-tool-cursor...
Alex
----
P.S. Sorry once again for a wrong link on bitmap/vector cursor before. This is a good one. opensourcebydesign.org/inkscape-concepts/bitmap-vector-comparision.svg
On 2010-09-09 12:54, J.B.C.Engelen@...1578... wrote:
... (about tool cursor with color preview) Pretty neat! Could you also implement this for the spiral, pen(cil) and calligraphy tools?
Hi everyone! Jasper, I have just tried a build with the implemented cursor-color indicator. Nice work! ;) Considering Mr. Engelen's question, how about this? (please check out the attachment) Would this be acceptable?
xpm can support transparency, but not levels of transparency, if I am not mistaken... Before, I was goofing around with the GIMP UI and replaced the tool icons and cursors in with SVG files. And those icons looked really cool and smooth! ;) So, I wanted to ask... or suggest... Can we do the same in Inkscape and use svg instead xpm? While still using the tool-cursor-color indicators, of course ;)...
Cheers, Alex
participants (4)
-
Aleksandar Kovac -
Alex Kovac -
Alexandre Prokoudine -
Jasper van de Gronde