https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=158253
Bug ID: 158253
Summary: Shapes-via-Gallery is problematic & partially
redundant with the Shapes sub-toolbars and sidebar
Product: LibreOffice
Version: unspecified
Hardware: All
OS: All
Status: UNCONFIRMED
Severity: normal
Priority: medium
Component: LibreOffice
Assignee: [email protected]
Reporter: [email protected]
LO has a useful categorized set of shapes, accessible via category
button-dialogs/sub-toolbars on the Drawing toolbar, and in some modules through
the Shapes sidebar.
I find this UI well-designed, easy to grasp quickly, with its capabilities
easily committed to memory and becoming "accessible-by-reflex" almost.
At the same time, we have someplace else from which we can introduce shapes
into a document: Shapes with the Gallery.
Here,
* Categorization is rough and inaccurate, with categories overlapping
* Shapes are mixed with non-"shape" media, and it's not clear
* Ordering seems arbitrary (it's actually by gallery item name, but one only
notices that if using an icon+name view)
* Choices involving multiple irrelevant features: Fill type and color,
extrusion choice etc. - masking the structural differences between shapes.
Example: The stars.
* Many choices are completely redundant with shapes available via the toolbars,
such as rectangular textboxes (many of these), many of the arrows etc.
This is exacerbated by the paucity of shape control logic, e.g. in the example
of the stars - one could replace ~10 stars by a single star with a variable
number of points.
The result is the gallery having low-usability IMHO for finding useful shapes,
with the sense that it's "a pile of mostly-irrelevant stuff". And yet, it does
have several items which might have been added to the shapes sidebar /
sub-toolbars, with appropriate icons emphasizing their essence.
I'm not advocating for the removal of the gallery of course. But the question
of its role in holding shapes vis-a-vis the shapes sidebar / sub-toolbars needs
to be given more consideration IMO.
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