Protoype GUI:
The thesis dragon was grievously wounded during the winter vacation...
unfortunately like the learningaHydra it is it is now threatening to grow a
second head (!) As we all know a wounded animals is even more dangerous I
cannot guarantee a finished g.u.i before the summer. Still i think that i may
have also dealt a severe blow to the giant undimensional interphase...
rendering transdimensional space an even more dangerous place...
Enough rambling. I have sent Alain, Uli, and Mr. DeRobertis a copy of a draft
prototype GUI. I am hoping to upload it to the UQAM site this week. Features
are described below (this is the letter i sent them).
EXACT TEXT OF LETTER SENT TO THEM FOLLOWS:
---------------------------------------------------------------
Enclosed is a 1 meg attachment. It contains the beginnings of a GUI.
The new menus do _not work. They are prototypes. Scott mentioned that Uli did
some work already on menus, or had some ideas - so feed back is appreciated!
Also enclosed : 3 prototype icon stacks. Again this is a prototype. The
numeration of the icons is _not final - some will be renumbered. Most will
not. Masks and a transparent background for all icons will also be added.
Prototype palettes:
The floating tool palette and the metacard menu bar tool palette are
different. Let me know what you think of them.
The small tools palette is the beginning of my opinion - that 2 palettes, one
for art and one for programming are a better approach.
As you will see, palettes are easy.
Navigational palette:
The stack palette navigation is changed. There is a also a prototype nav bar
called Nav.mc or na.mc
Script editor 1 looks a lot more like the HC script editor
The message box looks a lot more like HC.
As you can see a lot of my design philosophy is influenced by HC. Can easily
develop nav and tool palettes for hc...
Color schemes
Blue on yellow is easy to read. with blue highlight
Black and white for dialog boxes with teal highlight
grays for other programming environment stuff.
Font schemes:
Not much changed
Chicago for program messages (buttons, dialogues)
Helvetica for plain text
Note also that the help stacks have been resized and icons have been changed
for the home stack
Where we need to go from here:
Two steps
1) Menus
2) Programming dialogues (properties stack).
Who is interested in doing what? I would prefer doing menus, as i actually
think the tab stop system is fine. Would be nice to add shortcuts to access
object scripts (shift double click for example) though. Easily resized and
rearranged.
Oh my design philosophy is also influenced by
1) kis - keep it simple
2) yReinventTheWheel
so i do not think a radical rearrangement of the GUI is necessary : in other
words, my idea is reform a visually challenged gui with a face lift.
I will finalize the icons, and probably redo the tool and nav palettes. But in
termes of advancing the project the two steps are
1) more menus
2) better dialogues for the programming environment (the tab stops- really
they are different,but i think they are ok - though an automatic window
centering routine would be nice for when a previously opened window gets
activated.
Now my question:
Can you please upload this information wherever it is meant to be? (preferable
from my perspective).
If not can you at least tell me where and how i can upload it
(i have _never uploaded to a web site and am somewhat leary of it especially
since uploading 1 meg takes about ten minutes.)
Best regards!
-----------------------
Oh, for clarities sake, licensing issues : there are two licensing questions.
1) how mc can license to us
2) how we license to end users.
both dependant upon whether we form a partnership.
If we want to create a partnership just let me know (the subject has been
quiet, which is good, i prefer action to talk). In such a case, persons
interested in being partners should let me know as that will allow
concentration of effort. Note that being a partner would be a real chore - so
again i can easily exclude myself from such a position if that is preferable.
At the same point i can guarantee a certain commitment of time and energy. I
certainly believe we can have a working gui by next winter at the latest,
(possibly even this spring - depends on whether the dragon is fire
breathing...)
All the best!
Eric Engle
As
Eric Engle
____________________________________________________________________
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