Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
Adrien Monteleone-2 wrote > In the meantime, making the app work correctly is certainly more > important, as is re-working the code base to eventually facilitate a move > to an MVC pattern that might facilitate easier visual customization, or at > least more native platform integration to remove the occasion for the > requests. Well, I wholeheartedly agree on that one. Even just getting the data store to be a clean relational database would help immensely in providing a solid base for alternative UIs (like web, mobile, etc.). For example, I'd be happy to experiment with NativeScript and create a basic app that could post, or at least read, the transactions from the book on both mobile platforms, or something along those lines, but I'm still reluctant to generate any transactions from outside GnuCash. -- Sent from: http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/GnuCash-Dev-f1435356.html ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
> On Oct 19, 2018, at 9:38 AM, cicko wrote: > > > My point, on the other hand, would be - the users want customizations and > that won't change anytime soon. And you can confirm that simply by > considering the amount of questions on this list referring to fonts, > spacing, colors, sizes, icons, etc. > Unfortunately. > A non-scientific recollection based on recent threads is that most of this is coming from the Windows base. There are some UI bugs I see asked about on Mac, and a few window sizing issues on linux, but most of the desire for visual changes is from people on Windows who liked the old GTK2 look and don’t like the GTK3 styling with respect to colors and especially padding. Maybe linux users can figure out how to use the gtk-inspector and learn enough CSS to make things work for them and we don’t hear anything. Maybe MacOS users are so used to not being able to change much of anything, they just accept the new look. (and some like me, prefer it with a few custom CSS tweaks) I don’t know if you can extrapolate the number of users *asking* for styling assistance on the Windows platform to what total percentage of downloads for that platform actually want customization, but I’d say the *need* is rather tiny. Overall, I’d hazard a rough guess that less than 10 users have been involved in such threads from the asking perspective. Personally, I don’t think GnuCash needs to worry about theming other than to try to follow best practices and not introduce many, or any, custom widgets that can break via different desktop themes. Support a light and dark variant app theme that looks decent across Windows, Mac, Gnome & Ubuntu as that will cover 99%+ of the user base, with the GTK3 and CSS wiki pages for the fraction of 1% left out. Ideally, if someone could figure out how to run gtk-inspector on Windows, that might be helpful for those folks. In the meantime, making the app work correctly is certainly more important, as is re-working the code base to eventually facilitate a move to an MVC pattern that might facilitate easier visual customization, or at least more native platform integration to remove the occasion for the requests. Regards, Adrien ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
While it is true that many users on Gnucash lists bemoan the latest theme selections, I agree with Geert, John, and the blogger that the tendency is away from such individualization. I am reminded of the wonders of dot matrix printers way back when; there was an ecstatic enthusiasm for all the new font possibilities, and for a while, every document was a riot of different fonts. Eventually, most people decided to stick with just a few fonts and get on with life... As for the article, I was more intrigued by the comment early on that designing user interfaces with css is more for the developer set than the user base. It seems like we haven't gotten that memo, despite the strong evidence of its accuracy. Expecting users to write css to change the appearance is doomed to failure. David On October 19, 2018, at 8:09 PM, cicko wrote: Geert Janssens-4 wrote >> Well, I'm fairly confident that it is exactly the opposite. Just looking >> at >> trends in mobile apps tells me that clearly the users want to customize >> the >> apps to their preferences, mostly visual, rather than to have "more, >> better >> app" (whatever that means). > > Interestingly I'm not aware of visual styling customizations in any of the > mobile apps I use. They all seem to use the system's theme(s). I don't > find > options anywhere related to, hmm, I'd like a different font for this menu > item > or hide the label for that button, and oh, can the spacing between these > two > fields be reduced a bit ? Right. But choosing a different theme is a kind of visual customization, no? Not to mention the icon packs, custom emojis, and what not. That, of course, depends on the apps you use but I'm talking about a huge deal where I read "visually pleasing" and "easy customization" in the description and move on. Geert Janssens-4 wrote > The point I wanted to make by posting this article is really this: I think I get your point and actually agree with it, along with the point the guy was making in that article. But I'm a developer and I've noticed that my view is quite different to that of an average user. My point, on the other hand, would be - the users want customizations and that won't change anytime soon. And you can confirm that simply by considering the amount of questions on this list referring to fonts, spacing, colors, sizes, icons, etc. Unfortunately. -- Sent from: http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/GnuCash-Dev-f1435356.html ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
Geert Janssens-4 wrote >> Well, I'm fairly confident that it is exactly the opposite. Just looking >> at >> trends in mobile apps tells me that clearly the users want to customize >> the >> apps to their preferences, mostly visual, rather than to have "more, >> better >> app" (whatever that means). > > Interestingly I'm not aware of visual styling customizations in any of the > mobile apps I use. They all seem to use the system's theme(s). I don't > find > options anywhere related to, hmm, I'd like a different font for this menu > item > or hide the label for that button, and oh, can the spacing between these > two > fields be reduced a bit ? Right. But choosing a different theme is a kind of visual customization, no? Not to mention the icon packs, custom emojis, and what not. That, of course, depends on the apps you use but I'm talking about a huge deal where I read "visually pleasing" and "easy customization" in the description and move on. Geert Janssens-4 wrote > The point I wanted to make by posting this article is really this: I think I get your point and actually agree with it, along with the point the guy was making in that article. But I'm a developer and I've noticed that my view is quite different to that of an average user. My point, on the other hand, would be - the users want customizations and that won't change anytime soon. And you can confirm that simply by considering the amount of questions on this list referring to fonts, spacing, colors, sizes, icons, etc. Unfortunately. -- Sent from: http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/GnuCash-Dev-f1435356.html ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
> On Oct 19, 2018, at 6:25 AM, Geert Janssens > wrote: > > Op vrijdag 19 oktober 2018 09:43:14 CEST schreef cicko: >> Thanks a lot for the link, Geert. >> Unfortunately, I think the root of the problem is this: "If given a choice >> between customization and more, better apps, I’m confident the majority of >> people would prefer the latter." >> >> Well, I'm fairly confident that it is exactly the opposite. Just looking at >> trends in mobile apps tells me that clearly the users want to customize the >> apps to their preferences, mostly visual, rather than to have "more, better >> app" (whatever that means). > > Interestingly I'm not aware of visual styling customizations in any of the > mobile apps I use. They all seem to use the system's theme(s). I don't find > options anywhere related to, hmm, I'd like a different font for this menu > item > or hide the label for that button, and oh, can the spacing between these two > fields be reduced a bit ? > >> Also, the users clearly do not want more apps >> that do more-or-less the same thing. Well, that just promises that the >> debate on the topic will continue be going on, at least for a while. :) >> I agree with Geert: There are no styling options on any of the Android apps I use. You get what you get. That’s pretty much also true of the Windows and MacOS apps that I use; what little theming is available is at the system level, and Microsoft has substantially *reduced* the user styling options in Win10 compared to Win7. Regards, John Ralls ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
Op vrijdag 19 oktober 2018 09:43:14 CEST schreef cicko: > Thanks a lot for the link, Geert. > Unfortunately, I think the root of the problem is this: "If given a choice > between customization and more, better apps, I’m confident the majority of > people would prefer the latter." > > Well, I'm fairly confident that it is exactly the opposite. Just looking at > trends in mobile apps tells me that clearly the users want to customize the > apps to their preferences, mostly visual, rather than to have "more, better > app" (whatever that means). Interestingly I'm not aware of visual styling customizations in any of the mobile apps I use. They all seem to use the system's theme(s). I don't find options anywhere related to, hmm, I'd like a different font for this menu item or hide the label for that button, and oh, can the spacing between these two fields be reduced a bit ? > Also, the users clearly do not want more apps > that do more-or-less the same thing. Well, that just promises that the > debate on the topic will continue be going on, at least for a while. :) > I'm sure :) The point I wanted to make by posting this article is really this: If the gtk project itself (the projects responsible for consistent styling of all applications using their toolkit) is considering custome theming too hard and requiring more developer attention than they have available, how would you expect GnuCash with a *much* smaller developer base to reasonably spend time on it ? We're only a small team with our hands full making GnuCash work well. That is complex enough as it is. So if possible I prefer to keep the theming debate out of GnuCash as much as possible. Put differently, GnuCash will be as themable as the toolkit it is based on. For now our toolkit of choice is Gtk. If we ever switch to a different toolkit in the future, the theming capabilities of GnuCash may be better or worse. Note that I'm talking about *theming* in here. Good design on the other hand (what makes an application easy to use, yet powerful) is a whole different matter and that I do care deeply about. Geert ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
Re: [GNC-dev] Gtk and themes
Thanks a lot for the link, Geert. Unfortunately, I think the root of the problem is this: "If given a choice between customization and more, better apps, I’m confident the majority of people would prefer the latter." Well, I'm fairly confident that it is exactly the opposite. Just looking at trends in mobile apps tells me that clearly the users want to customize the apps to their preferences, mostly visual, rather than to have "more, better app" (whatever that means). Also, the users clearly do not want more apps that do more-or-less the same thing. Well, that just promises that the debate on the topic will continue be going on, at least for a while. :) -- Sent from: http://gnucash.1415818.n4.nabble.com/GnuCash-Dev-f1435356.html ___ gnucash-devel mailing list gnucash-devel@gnucash.org https://lists.gnucash.org/mailman/listinfo/gnucash-devel
