**** BEGIN LOGGING AT Thu Feb 16 16:59:22 2006 Feb 16 16:59:22 --> You are now talking on #ui-review Feb 16 16:59:22 --- Topic for #ui-review is currently reviewing http://burtonini.com/temp/sj-start-ripping.png Feb 16 16:59:22 --- Topic for #ui-review set by calum at Mon Feb 13 18:13:20 2006 Feb 16 17:00:51 wow, first time the maintainer's been here on time all week :) Feb 16 17:01:25 --> behdad (~behdad@CPE000fb55e466d-CM014250035807.cpe.net.cable.rogers.com) has joined #ui-review Feb 16 17:01:32 morning Feb 16 17:01:40 hi Feb 16 17:01:42 --> joachim (~joachim@ACD53D2D.ipt.aol.com) has joined #ui-review Feb 16 17:02:27 zwnj: ping Feb 16 17:02:36 hi behdad, calum Feb 16 17:02:47 well I just crashed it Feb 16 17:02:54 :) Feb 16 17:02:57 heh Feb 16 17:03:02 joachim: gucharmap? Feb 16 17:03:08 select Devanagari from the list Feb 16 17:03:26 joachim: that's prolly a pango+cairo crash. Feb 16 17:03:31 worked for me :) Feb 16 17:03:47 joachim: probably this one: https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=5734 Feb 16 17:04:12 which version of gucharmap do we need to be looking at, btw...? Feb 16 17:04:23 so, I'm not sure gucharmap has been extensively reviewed previously, but from the ChangeLogs I can say some work has been done. Feb 16 17:04:40 calum: HEAD or 1.5.2 does it. Feb 16 17:04:53 cool Feb 16 17:04:56 * calum has 1.5.2 Feb 16 17:05:01 but recently zwnj has been making some UI changes, nothing fancy. like adding a couple options to the search dialog Feb 16 17:05:11 and rewording the character details page. Feb 16 17:05:26 1.5.1 here Feb 16 17:05:53 ok, guess we'll need to screenshots for you then :) Feb 16 17:06:01 * zwnj tries to update from cvs Feb 16 17:06:33 joachim: can you checkout/download? Feb 16 17:06:47 the only change between 1.5.1 and 1.5.2 is in the about dialog btw. Feb 16 17:06:57 about dialog has been revamped in the name of HIG too :) Feb 16 17:07:19 nothing fancy again. a license button added, and "gucharmap" changed to "GNOME Character Map" Feb 16 17:07:47 sorry, no. building is beyond me Feb 16 17:07:57 ok, well, I guess we could start by just doing a quick review of the main window, then the new dialogs, then anything else we have time for... Feb 16 17:08:06 I don't mind sitting this one out if nobody else needs screenshots Feb 16 17:08:10 "GNOME Character Map Feb 16 17:08:10 based on Unicode Character Database" I personally don't like this, and it lacks a "the" anyway. Feb 16 17:08:24 we should probably wait a couple of minutes to see if anyone else turns up anyway :) Feb 16 17:08:25 I can upload shots hopefully fast enough. Feb 16 17:08:34 behdad: I didn't changed the Title Feb 16 17:09:01 zwnj: fine. didn't said you did :) Feb 16 17:09:16 behdad: so you did? Feb 16 17:09:31 no Feb 16 17:09:33 --> andreasn (~andreas@h108n3fls33o1104.telia.com) has joined #ui-review Feb 16 17:10:22 <-- andreasn (~andreas@h108n3fls33o1104.telia.com) has left #ui-review Feb 16 17:10:56 zwnj: oh oh. I see the "Contents" entry is missing from the Help menu. Feb 16 17:11:24 behdad: you missed the HAVE_GNOEM Feb 16 17:11:52 it requires libgnome,etc >= 2.13.4 i think Feb 16 17:12:10 oh, ok. Feb 16 17:12:14 * behdad is uploading a few shots. Feb 16 17:13:20 behdad: live.g.o/Gucharmap? Feb 16 17:14:55 http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/ Feb 16 17:15:30 cool, thx Feb 16 17:15:41 so, looks like this is all we're getting, so shall we just start with http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/Character%20Map-1.png ? Feb 16 17:15:46 the main problem I see is that for character details (Character Map-2.png), you should resize to a long vertical view to see it all. Feb 16 17:15:53 sure. Feb 16 17:17:21 ah, I see the list header is "Script" now, it's "Unicode Block" on mine... Feb 16 17:17:40 calum: oh, that's a mode you can choose in View menu Feb 16 17:17:46 View -> Unicode Block Feb 16 17:17:53 d'oh... yes, so it is :) Feb 16 17:18:00 uploading one of the other too Feb 16 17:18:28 behdad: have you seen Unibook? I could run it under wine. Feb 16 17:18:40 --> charles (~charles@nat.nssl.noaa.gov) has joined #ui-review Feb 16 17:19:07 zwnj: no. Feb 16 17:19:12 charles: hi, we've just started looking at http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/Character%20Map-1.png Feb 16 17:19:42 uploaded the other view too. Feb 16 17:19:47 thx Feb 16 17:19:59 op? topic Gucharmap | shots: http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/ Feb 16 17:20:10 yeah, sorry, we haven't had ops since Monday :/ Feb 16 17:20:24 threre's sort of a logical flaw with the two tabs for Table and Details Feb 16 17:21:12 joachim: yes, that's kind of a known problem currently. Feb 16 17:21:28 right. I'm not sure what to suggest anyway :) Feb 16 17:21:46 http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=130618 Feb 16 17:21:51 Bug 130618 – [UI-REVIEW] Move Character Details to separate dialog or switchable pane Feb 16 17:22:07 from the ui-review in jan 2004 :) Feb 16 17:22:10 in the screenshot you could have the font box wider. On mine it's wide enough though Feb 16 17:22:16 * calum remembers that :) Feb 16 17:22:17 behdad: would you upload those photos i sent to you on summer? Feb 16 17:23:49 I think a three column view (with the details column optional) is probably about the only thing you could try to fix it... the details page is kind of the wrong shape to have a details expander below the table or anything like that... Feb 16 17:24:28 zwnj has some sketches of a new ui, lemme find. Feb 16 17:24:53 what about center align the character in the details tab? Feb 16 17:24:55 calum: the problem with that obvisouly is that it probably doesn't fit in a 800x600 in any way. not that it's a problem if it's optional. Feb 16 17:25:12 zwnj: it's supposed to show the character direction. Feb 16 17:25:27 behdad: it's not the way... Feb 16 17:25:29 behdad: yeah, good point... even if it's optional, you'd still need some way to view it on an 800x600 Feb 16 17:25:53 maybe in a very large tooltip as you hovered over the character in the table :) Feb 16 17:26:14 calum: a tooltip would be rather cool, yeah. Feb 16 17:26:23 btw, we have a usability problem already Feb 16 17:26:30 right click on an entry in the table. Feb 16 17:26:46 it zooms and shows which font it has used to render that character. Feb 16 17:27:02 but this thing doesn't work with ancient window managers like tvwm that you need to place a window... Feb 16 17:27:04 tooltip behavior on the table is very bad Feb 16 17:27:12 I sometimes get an untitled window showing up in the window list when I right click in the table Feb 16 17:27:14 very weird Feb 16 17:27:35 hmm Feb 16 17:30:05 maybe we can first shoot any fixes that need to go into 2.14, then talk about future relayout. Feb 16 17:30:23 perhaps the script list could be a drop-down? That would give us some horizontal space to put the character table and details side-by-side Feb 16 17:30:53 behdad: probably wise :) Feb 16 17:31:14 charles: not sure if a drop down works quite as good Feb 16 17:31:26 here is some sketches zwnj came up with last summer: http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/zwnj/ Feb 16 17:31:41 some overcomplex layout called Advanced, with a more sane one called Normal :) Feb 16 17:32:30 point of fact is that the Character Details tab doesn't need to be too wide. Feb 16 17:32:42 heh... yeah, the normal view looks pretty much like what I was thinking about, really... Feb 16 17:32:47 so maybe they actually do fit in a reasonable screen if we resize a bit. Feb 16 17:33:34 hmm, the HIG does say dropdown lists shouldn't have more than about ten items, so I guess we wouldn't want to do that :) Feb 16 17:33:39 that may not be hard to do actually. not quite sure, but for somebody familiar with gtk+ hacking, it should be a 20minute change :) Feb 16 17:34:02 yeah, well, I wouldn't worry about it for 2.14 :) Feb 16 17:34:13 in Unicode Block view, the block list gets too wide, simply because some entries are too long. Feb 16 17:34:21 that doesn't look good and is not that useful. Feb 16 17:34:26 that list is going to be a tree in the (near?!) feature... Feb 16 17:34:26 heh, ok Feb 16 17:35:09 behdad: we cannot fix it's width Feb 16 17:35:20 what about moving the Script / Unicode Block thing into the tab for that list? Feb 16 17:35:29 instead of the harder-to-find View menu? Feb 16 17:35:49 because some block names just differ on an A/B at the end Feb 16 17:36:22 zwnj: that you can scroll to see, or read the full name in the tooltip (when that's supported) Feb 16 17:37:03 behdad: that's very annoying IMO Feb 16 17:37:05 hum, shall we change the font selection toolbar for a nifty font dialog? Feb 16 17:37:26 zwnj: you can resize it if you want, but taking more than half of the application view doesn't look quite right to me. Feb 16 17:38:37 behdad: so it just shouldn't change the width on changing script/block Feb 16 17:39:13 the unicode block list isn't sorted? Feb 16 17:39:27 charles: good point Feb 16 17:39:40 behdad: hmm, font dialog might be nice, but I think you'd probably still want to be able to tweak at least the size (if not the style) from the toolbar anyway, so I'm not sure it gets us much really... Feb 16 17:39:44 it's ordered by block numbers Feb 16 17:39:49 charles: no, it's ordered by the unicode codepoints. Feb 16 17:39:56 there's a bug for alphabetical sort Feb 16 17:40:01 behdad: other than a font preview, I guess Feb 16 17:40:03 calum: right. Feb 16 17:40:22 it's probably too tied to the font to use a separate dialog Feb 16 17:41:05 calum: but hard-coding bold and italic is limiting a bit, since fonts can have other styles Feb 16 17:41:17 behdad: yes true, that might be a good reason to change then Feb 16 17:41:34 i like to remove the font selection for the table and limit it to details tab Feb 16 17:42:18 zwnj: but font selection for the table is useful for seeing what the font supports and how does it look. Feb 16 17:42:28 zwnj: say you want to see which Arabic characters the font supports Feb 16 17:42:45 behdad: that doesn't work Feb 16 17:42:47 that of course needs an option to disable font fallbacks. Feb 16 17:43:24 that's needed to limit blocks to what font has Feb 16 17:43:28 blah blah Feb 16 17:43:48 heh Feb 16 17:44:03 and these are what font-viewer must have, not character map Feb 16 17:44:21 a good question probably is: is making it a font-viewer and character map combined together a good idea? Feb 16 17:44:50 we have requests for hiding characters that no font supports. Feb 16 17:44:55 behdad: that's exactly what i have in mind Feb 16 17:46:58 behdad: it is a good question, but probably not one we should worry about today :) Feb 16 17:47:25 calum: so we should remove many of font supports for know IMHO Feb 16 17:48:17 i like that report, replacing numeric font size with "Small" "Normal" "Big" ,etc Feb 16 17:48:59 but we cannot do this without font-view Feb 16 17:49:32 * zwnj داره می‌میره از بی‌خوابی! Feb 16 17:49:48 yeah, I would have no problem with that if you wanted to.... Feb 16 17:49:58 heh Feb 16 17:50:15 xchat didn't do a very good job of rendering that :) Feb 16 17:51:04 * zwnj feels so sleepy (~translated) Feb 16 17:51:12 is there any reason we don't use a proper toolbar control for the, er.. toolbar, btw? if it did, it could respect the settings in the menus & toolbars capplet... Feb 16 17:51:32 good point. Feb 16 17:52:47 sorry, I've to go. Feb 16 17:52:54 ok... Feb 16 17:52:59 will someone send a report please. Feb 16 17:53:03 zwnj: you maybe? Feb 16 17:53:14 calum: and thanks btw. Feb 16 17:53:23 no problem Feb 16 17:53:39 <-- behdad (~behdad@CPE000fb55e466d-CM014250035807.cpe.net.cable.rogers.com) has left #ui-review Feb 16 17:54:31 so, shall we move on to the new Find dialog, to keep us all awake? :) Feb 16 17:54:43 or does anyone have more comments on the main window? Feb 16 17:57:42 ok, http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/Find.png it is then... Feb 16 17:59:16 have to say the HIG would recommend that the three Find menu items should be on an Edit menu, rather than a Search menu... Feb 16 17:59:17 find / search? Feb 16 17:59:25 right :) Feb 16 17:59:34 though looking at some other dialogs, the standard label text seems to be 'Search for:' Feb 16 17:59:45 good point Feb 16 18:00:05 someone at Mozilla once told me find and search meant different things... :/ Feb 16 18:00:28 yeah, technically they do, but that doesn't translate very well so we stopped trying to explain it :) Feb 16 18:00:56 and just decided to go with Find for everything... Feb 16 18:01:36 why 'cancel'? there's nothing to cancel Feb 16 18:01:56 should be 'close', no? Feb 16 18:02:12 joachim: that could be close Feb 16 18:02:21 gedit has close, bluefish cancel Feb 16 18:02:42 but it cancels current search thread too Feb 16 18:03:18 is it better to have a 'search backwards' checkbox and just the one button? Feb 16 18:03:50 * calum thinks it should be Close too Feb 16 18:04:04 actually I quite like having both buttons, I find the checkbox annoying when I want to search backwards Feb 16 18:04:30 I'm inclined to agree, but 'Next' doesn't mean very much when you haven't found anything yet Feb 16 18:05:07 joachim: so you mean dynamic button label? Feb 16 18:05:14 *shrugs* Feb 16 18:05:31 yeah, dynamic label could work, although it sometimes annoys the accessibility people :/ Feb 16 18:06:00 calum: exactly Feb 16 18:06:04 (because screenreaders etc. then have to announce that something has changed) Feb 16 18:06:07 I think we should only worry about that level of detail if we were designing a cross-app find dialog Feb 16 18:06:11 i don't remember what HIG says Feb 16 18:06:23 ... which could be a nice thing :) Feb 16 18:06:39 HIG says to avoid dynamic labels if possible, IIRC... Feb 16 18:07:43 joachim: how about 'forward' instead of 'next'? Feb 16 18:08:29 how about disabling buttons on no result Feb 16 18:08:50 hmm, I think next is more correct than forward... you're asking it to find the next item, although you are asking it to /search/ forwards :) Feb 16 18:09:09 evince just has previous and next buttons too (and firefox has Find Previous and Find Next), so I guess it's consistent with those... Feb 16 18:09:09 ideally, 'Find next', but that's too long Feb 16 18:09:18 yeah Feb 16 18:09:48 zwnj: yes, we should probably do that anyway Feb 16 18:10:14 hope we had a widget like this: [ < | Find | > ] Feb 16 18:10:32 that would be too easy :) Feb 16 18:11:06 calum: i'm newbie on widget accessibility Feb 16 18:11:22 zwnj: join the club. :) Feb 16 18:12:00 it has some RTL problems BTW ;) Feb 16 18:13:12 heh, true :) Feb 16 18:13:38 well [close, previous, next] are a decent balance of clarity and terseness IMO Feb 16 18:14:08 yeah, I think that's probably fine Feb 16 18:14:21 there's not much to get wrong on a five-widget dialog Feb 16 18:14:23 good, and disable prev & next buttons on no result :) Feb 16 18:14:40 right-- and re-enable them when the user starts typing in the Search box again... Feb 16 18:14:57 try to... :D Feb 16 18:15:08 heh Feb 16 18:15:12 if you look Feb 16 18:15:38 they won't be enable until you type a non-space character ;) Feb 16 18:16:28 ok :) Feb 16 18:17:45 so, shall we just have a quick look at the about box? Feb 16 18:17:46 http://www.cs.toronto.edu/~behdad/ui/About%20Gucharmap.png Feb 16 18:18:23 ok Feb 16 18:18:26 one last thing on the find dialog: when the dialog first comes up, and when you close the `not found.' child dialog, should the gtkentry get focus? Feb 16 18:18:53 ah... yes, good idea Feb 16 18:19:09 charles: good point, ok Feb 16 18:21:41 so, the about box... anything controversial there? Apart from the missing 'the' that behdad mentioned :) Feb 16 18:22:16 i had put unicode version too, but we had problems about translation, so removed for now Feb 16 18:22:37 ok... Feb 16 18:22:40 fine Feb 16 18:22:43 calum: don't think so Feb 16 18:23:05 is there any way we can make the URL into a live link? Feb 16 18:23:33 calum: i'll look around, gedit has one Feb 16 18:23:37 does the gtkabout dialog support live links? Feb 16 18:23:44 or should we have live.gnome.org stuff in about boxes anyway, as that site is really for developers? Feb 16 18:23:56 charles: i set the "link" property Feb 16 18:23:58 charles: dunno, that's why I asked :) Feb 16 18:24:29 There's no gtk equivalent of gnome_url_show AFAIK Feb 16 18:25:04 "website", "http://live.gnome.org/Gucharmap", Feb 16 18:25:26 * joachim is off. bye :) Feb 16 18:25:36 <-- joachim has quit (Leaving) Feb 16 18:25:39 so i cannot do anything till it uses gtk_show_about_dialog() Feb 16 18:25:52 ok... Feb 16 18:27:36 so, if there's no more on the about box, shall we just have a quick look through the menus to finish off? Feb 16 18:28:22 I was wondering what is the point of `snap columns to power of two' Feb 16 18:28:39 I was going to ask that too :) Feb 16 18:28:59 (and it needs an access key, too...) Feb 16 18:30:11 ok Feb 16 18:30:15 (so do Go->Next Script and Go->Previous Script, just while I notice...) Feb 16 18:30:17 that's hackerish Feb 16 18:30:35 helps user to see tables like the unicode book Feb 16 18:30:53 in fixed rows of 8 or 16 cells Feb 16 18:31:21 you can find chars by code faster in this way Feb 16 18:32:08 ok... so perhaps it should just be the default, and not allow the user to change it at all? Or would that be too restrictive? Feb 16 18:33:21 forcing snap-to-^2 would be better than having such an obscure menu item Feb 16 18:34:04 IMO the feature is a wart anyway: if the point is looking up by code, ^2 is only going to get you halfway there -- the rows should be numbered. Feb 16 18:34:34 and if you number the rows (or put the code in the right-click popup) then the need for ^2 goes away. Feb 16 18:34:35 calum: the problem is when Feb 16 18:34:47 we want to hide unassigned characters Feb 16 18:34:57 but Feb 16 18:35:51 it's very good if we go for small, normal, big font sizes and set the font size such that we get 16, 8, and 4 columns Feb 16 18:36:39 hmm, ok... well, the other alternative is just to think of a better name for the menu item, of course :) Feb 16 18:37:27 have to decide for this now? Feb 16 18:37:47 no, not unless anybody has any great ideas :) Feb 16 18:37:56 is there a downside to it being on all the time and removing the button? Feb 16 18:39:04 the problem is when Feb 16 18:39:20 user make window wider Feb 16 18:39:28 but cannot get more cells on the screen Feb 16 18:39:44 yeah, that could be annoying I guess Feb 16 18:40:20 zwnj: yes, that's true Feb 16 18:40:34 * zwnj thinks all we do actually better than MS and KDE ones :D Feb 16 18:41:18 ok, well let's just note it as maybe something to think about again for 2.16, then... Feb 16 18:41:25 *nod* Feb 16 18:41:45 any other comments on the menus? Feb 16 18:42:13 is there any reason to have Ctrl+N/P as shortcuts for Next/Previous character, when the arrow keys work just fine? Feb 16 18:42:58 oh, I suppose it's because they work when the Details tab is showing... Feb 16 18:43:26 calum: yep :) Feb 16 18:43:28 you wouldn't be able to use the arrow keys in the font type / font size entry fields... Feb 16 18:43:47 zwnj: another reason to do that redesign :) Feb 16 18:44:00 charles: yes, that's true too, although I can't think of many situations where you'd need to do that... Feb 16 18:44:54 calum: i prefer to not move my hand Feb 16 18:45:14 why use arrow keys when there are easier ways to do :D Feb 16 18:45:39 * calum finds pressing one key a lot easier than holding down two :) Feb 16 18:46:22 * zwnj believes moving arm is harder :D Feb 16 18:46:45 hehe... ok, so that was my only other comment on the menus I think... anyone have anything else, on the menus or otherwise? Feb 16 18:47:44 well with very little code, we could still replace ctrl-n/p with arrow keys. you'd only need to add a keypress signal listener in the details tab Feb 16 18:48:48 the arrow keys move the text cursor around in the details tab now, though (which is handy if you want to copy and paste stuff)... would we want to override that? Feb 16 18:49:16 no. :) you're right. Feb 16 18:50:42 anyway, aside from adding some access keys and punting ^2, I don't see anything else in the menus Feb 16 18:51:09 ok, well that covers everything for me too I think... Feb 16 18:51:35 this was kind of fun; thanks for putting up with some of my newbie suggestions. :) Feb 16 18:51:43 later Feb 16 18:51:49 charles: see ya Feb 16 18:51:52 <-- charles (~charles@nat.nssl.noaa.gov) has left #ui-review Feb 16 18:51:52 zwnj: would you like me to send you a copy of the IRC log? Or should I send one to behdad? Feb 16 18:52:38 we appreciated that Feb 16 18:52:41 but Feb 16 18:52:52 i don't like "^2" in the menu Feb 16 18:53:04 it's very user-unfriendly Feb 16 18:53:36 yeah... well, I have to go now too, but I'll think about it overnight and let you know tomorrow if I have any ideas :) Feb 16 18:53:42 but maybe somthing like "managed columns" would be cool Feb 16 18:54:02 ok, so let continue on email if needed Feb 16 18:54:05 ok, cool Feb 16 18:54:12 calum, thanks a lot :) Feb 16 18:54:20 no problem :) Feb 16 18:54:30 goodnight Feb 16 18:54:32 <-- zwnj (~zwnj@213.233.163.5) has left #ui-review Feb 16 18:54:38 --- Disconnected (). **** ENDING LOGGING AT Thu Feb 16 18:54:38 2006