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dalepres
03-19-2015, 04:29 AM
Ok. I know I said I was done but this one keeps bugging me. The inspector has some usability inconsistencies just within the inspector and compared, generally, to other Windows apps.

Could you have an OK and Cancel button in the Inspectors? I always find myself mousing to the bottom and then going up to the top to click the little red X. OK and Cancel buttons, for one thing, would be bigger than the little red X but they are also just where we go by habit. And it would overcome the issue that I regularly lose my string and fret count setting changes because I forget to apply them individually. An OK button at the bottom to apply all my changes would be more standard and really make the app perfect.

I know that these suggestions are not huge issues. It speaks well of the work done so far on the app that the suggestions I have made are the biggest problems I found.

Dean
03-23-2015, 08:23 PM
Hi Dale

Thanks for the suggestion, I will put it forward to rest of the team for consideration.


OK and Cancel buttons, for one thing, would be bigger than the little red X but they are also just where we go by habit.

The quickest way to close the Inspector is the Escape / ESC key. Some people prefer to keep the Inspector open all together, which is why we'll be adding a dockable option in ND v2. The Inspector should update to whatever element is in focus so leaving it open should hopefully seem smoother than double clicking, hitting the icon or CTRL+I shortcut.

But everyone has different workflows.


And it would overcome the issue that I regularly lose my string and fret count setting changes because I forget to apply them individually

Yes, I believe these are the only two parameters that need confirming via the Apply buttons. Everything else updates on the fly.

So would the OK button just be on the Board tab or in a fixed position at the bottom of every tab in the Inspector? And should hitting OK close the Inspector or just apply any changes?

Also the Cancel button, that would force ND to revert any changes since the Inspector was opened / you clicked OK?

Not saying these will go in, but just so I now what to put forward to the guys as a suggestion.

Thanks
Dean

Justin
03-23-2015, 08:58 PM
And it would overcome the issue that I regularly lose my string and fret count setting changes because I forget to apply them individually.

Top tip: when you type into the Frets/Starting Frets text boxes then just hit then ENTER key which'll do the same as apply but won't involve you taking your hand off the keyboard to use the mouse/trackpad!

Or you can TAB to next widget (Apply button) and use SPACE to 'click' it, but that's more effort than just ENTER ;)

dalepres
03-24-2015, 01:43 PM
Thanks for the tips, Justin. I'll work on those habits.

Dean, I'm a developer doing .Net for 15 years, Java for about 18, and Windows for 20+ years. The standard behavior, just because you asked what I thought it should be if you do decide to do something, is make changes in the settings window (or Inspector in the case of Neck Diagrams) and click Apply when you're all done or click Close which applies and closes. It gives consistent behavior to all the changes in the Inspector and with other Windows apps.

As I said before, the things that I thought were just slightly less than perfect in the app really are minor, this included. And of the 4 suggestions I made, it turns out there is a way to do 2 of them.

Keep up the great work.

Justin
03-24-2015, 10:12 PM
We won't be adding an OK/Cancel button to the Inspector I'm afraid (Dale?), no point beating about the bush!

It's not a standard dialog-type window in the manner you're thinking, it's more like a modeless-oversized-toolbar-window-thing :)

As Dean pointed out changing settings is meant to be instant - click something and you see the effect it had, just click again or use Undo to revert. Trouble with text boxes though is you never know when the user is done, hence the ENTER key as a shortcut alternative to clicking APPLY.

With an OK/Cancel model you'd potentially be able to change so many things in one go that you wouldn't know which option had what effect if there was something in the edits you didn't want! And undo would revert the whole lot, not the one thing you wanted..

Pretty much every dev I know hates taking their hands off the keyboard as grabbing the mouse slows down your flow, so hopefully tabbing around or hitting ENTER might be second nature to you already?!

Erik in NJ
01-08-2016, 01:26 AM
Hi,

Not having an OK/Cancel button in the inspector to me is very counter intuitive. It took me a while to figure out that closing the window applies the changes. This goes against everything I have done with PCs/Macs in the past 25 years. I hope you will reconsider these buttons in the Inspector (which in itself is a bit of a confusing name). Not being critical of your work--love the software, just trying to make it better--that's all.

Dean
01-08-2016, 03:07 PM
Hi Erik

Thanks for the input but still no plans to change this. The Inspector, which is a very common term in modern software, especially in graphics programs (Adobe, Sketch, Xara) and music apps (Cubase, Studio One, Sonar, Pro Tools) is not a separate dialogue window as such.

It's commonly a vertical tool bar back can be floated, docked or hidden and gives quick access to parameters and off the top of my head, I don't recall an ok/apply button for the Inspector in any of the apps I mentioned above. They all work on the fly.


It took me a while to figure out that closing the window applies the changes.

Can I ask which parameter you're trying to update that requires closing the Inspector? Maybe we can suggest an alternative workflow.

Also, as mentioned further up the thread, we're soon adding a dock-able option for the Inspector, we certainly don't want users to have to close it to update any edits, that defeats the purpose of the Inspector.

Regards
Dean