On Monday 22 May 2006 18:46, Ed Leafe wrote: > On May 21, 2006, at 12:58 PM, johnf wrote: > > I asked the wxPython list why we can't get rid of sizers. It start > > a good > > discussion. Dabo was in at least two emails. I keep thinking > > there has to > > be a way to get a point and shoot interface. Don't get me wrong - > > sizers > > work. Just that development time is way up compared to VFP. I can > > design a > > complex customer screen in 20 minutes compared to a couple of hours > > (sometimes longer) using sizers. And if the customer asks for a > > change - > > that can be a disaster. > > That sort of interface (absolute positioning) is the default in > PythonCard, and was the original approach I took in the Class > Designer. But since a fundamental quality of Dabo is that it is cross- > platform, sizers are *necessary* to achieve a platform-independent > layout. There are simply too many differences between the various > platforms to be able to create a UI that looks great on all without > jumping through hoops. Thus, the Class Designer was re-written, this > time as a sizer-centric tool. > > It's almost there, IMO. There have been lots of wonderful > suggestions by people who are working with it to make it as easy as > possible to use efficiently, and I welcome any others people can > think of. Then, when the sizer-based tool is complete, I plan on > adding the ability to do absolute positioning. That should be > relatively simple after dealing with the various permutations of > sizer nesting that are required for complex designs. Contrast that > with the efforts being made with PythonCard, which has a really slick > designer tool, but which cannot yet handle sizers - they're going to > have a really tough time integrating a sizer-centric design into > their current tool. So while it's been a tougher road to follow > initially, I believe that solving the sizer issue first was the right > way to do things. > > So yeah, at some point we'll be able to throw together a form in a > couple of minutes, and as long as it's always shown on the same > version of the OS at the same resolution on machines that have the > same fonts installed, it will look great. That's just not our first > priority. > > -- Ed Leafe > -- http://leafe.com > -- http://dabodev.com I'm suggesting that sizers be the basic building blocks - they work. I just believe there has to been a better way to create the sizers to match the needs of the developer. I think you would agree that in VFP you can create a very good looking complex form in minutes. But of course it does not resize. I think it is possible to generate a form with the required sizers by looking at the controls. Of course there would have be new properties (Hints to the sizers) that provide the information about sizing. As an example the button: 1. I need info about accepting different fonts 2. I need the min size 3. I need info how to grow
Take a data textcontrol: Why grow larger than the field size (relative to the font size). Yet you allowed the textcontrol in the sizer screencast to grow/expand as large as the screen. Maybe the font size should have changed. Us old farts would like the forms to grow to include the fonts. You see although sizers work they are not perfect. All the platforms have true fonts available. Why not just grow proportionally. We have computers that come with dual-cores today. Graphic cards that support more ram than many of my computers did just a few years ago. Let's use all that power. John _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/dabo-dev
