improve organization of Extensions menu

brynn

4 Sep 2018 4 Sep '18

12:11 a.m.

Hi Friends, As part of my project to get all the known external extensions listed in one place, and trying to organize them (using the current Extensions menu as a starting place) I've realized that how the Extensions menu is organized might need some improvement. I've also discussed it privately with a couple of other users. So I thought I'd bring up the subject with developers.

For example.

1 -- Should Stylesheet be a submenu under Web? 2 -- Should Typography be a submenu under Text?

Currently, many extension makers seem to be making their own submenus for their extensions. For people who use a lot of external extensions, I wonder if their menus are harder to use. If we had the menu already organized, it might inspire extension makers to put their extensions into the pre-existing submenus, rather than make their own.

3 -- Should there be a Gcode submenu under Export? (more about Export submenu below)

In my list, I've created a separate Gcode category. There are lots of external extensions which produce gcode (approx 20). I don't know where they would show up in the Extensions menu, yet (since I just now learned how to find out). But as I said, it might help keep the menu clean, to have submenus ready for the external extensions, even if there might not be any built-in extensions for some submenus.

4 -- Should the current Gcodetools submenu appear within this proposed Gcode submenu?

5 -- To accomodate external extensions, both Render and Export need to be divided into several submenus.

6 -- I've also created a new category (for my list) Animation/Presentation (currently 10 or 12 of them). It seems like the existing JessyInk submenu should go under there (assuming we were to agree on adding such a submenu).

7 -- There are 3 external extensions which comprise a Boolean category. But shouldn't Boolean be under the existing Modify Path submenu?

8 -- And once I get all the external ones organized, I guess other instances of potentially improved organization might come to light.

If anyone else has any observations about improving the organization of the Extensions menu, please feel free to make comments :-)

Yes, I realize a lot of developers are getting ready to go to Hackfest. But I wanted to mention this, in case it might come up. Otherwise, it can still be discussed, now or later.

Thank you very much, brynn

Show replies by date

C R

4 Sep 4 Sep

12:36 a.m.

Thanks for the work, Brynn! I'd like to suggest that the "Render" category be changed to "Generate", because "Render" in graphics is most often the generation of raster graphics from data (such as vectors).

The rest of your proposal sounds good to me. -C

On Tue, Sep 4, 2018 at 1:11 AM brynn <brynn@...3089...> wrote:

...

Hi Friends, As part of my project to get all the known external extensions listed in one place, and trying to organize them (using the current Extensions menu as a starting place) I've realized that how the Extensions menu is organized might need some improvement. I've also discussed it privately with a couple of other users. So I thought I'd bring up the subject with developers.
    For example.
1 -- Should Stylesheet be a submenu under Web? 2 -- Should Typography be a submenu under Text?
    Currently, many extension makers seem to be making their own
submenus for their extensions. For people who use a lot of external extensions, I wonder if their menus are harder to use. If we had the menu already organized, it might inspire extension makers to put their extensions into the pre-existing submenus, rather than make their own.

3 -- Should there be a Gcode submenu under Export? (more about Export submenu below)
    In my list, I've created a separate Gcode category.  There are
lots of external extensions which produce gcode (approx 20). I don't know where they would show up in the Extensions menu, yet (since I just now learned how to find out). But as I said, it might help keep the menu clean, to have submenus ready for the external extensions, even if there might not be any built-in extensions for some submenus.

4 -- Should the current Gcodetools submenu appear within this proposed Gcode submenu?

5 -- To accomodate external extensions, both Render and Export need to be divided into several submenus.

6 -- I've also created a new category (for my list) Animation/Presentation (currently 10 or 12 of them). It seems like the existing JessyInk submenu should go under there (assuming we were to agree on adding such a submenu).

7 -- There are 3 external extensions which comprise a Boolean category. But shouldn't Boolean be under the existing Modify Path submenu?

8 -- And once I get all the external ones organized, I guess other instances of potentially improved organization might come to light.
    If anyone else has any observations about improving the
organization of the Extensions menu, please feel free to make comments :-)
    Yes, I realize a lot of developers are getting ready to go to
Hackfest. But I wanted to mention this, in case it might come up. Otherwise, it can still be discussed, now or later.

Thank you very much, brynn

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Andrew Kurn

5:29 a.m.

On Tue 4 Sep 2018 01:36 +0100, C R wrote:

...

Thanks for the work, Brynn! I'd like to suggest that the "Render" category be changed to "Generate", because "Render" in graphics is most often the generation of raster graphics from data (such as vectors).

The rest of your proposal sounds good to me. -C

Just to add my voice: I'm strongly in favor.

Andrew

brynn

5 Sep 5 Sep

5:31 p.m.

Thanks for your comments, C R.

I would worry that naming it "Generate" would create confusion with the other submenu called "Generate from Path". I wonder if another word might be better?

What about "Create"? Or "Draw"? Maybe "Display"???

All best, brynn

-----Original Message----- From: C R Sent: Monday, September 03, 2018 6:36 PM To: Inkscape User Community Cc: inkscape-devel Subject: Re: [Inkscape-user] improve organization of Extensions menu

The rest of your proposal sounds good to me. -C

On Tue, Sep 4, 2018 at 1:11 AM brynn <brynn@...3089...> wrote: Hi Friends, As part of my project to get all the known external extensions listed in one place, and trying to organize them (using the current Extensions menu as a starting place) I've realized that how the Extensions menu is organized might need some improvement. I've also discussed it privately with a couple of other users. So I thought I'd bring up the subject with developers.