Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Hi, -Original Message- From: geda-user-boun...@moria.seul.org [mailto:geda-user-boun...@moria.seul.org] On Behalf Of kai-martin knaak Sent: Wednesday, August 18, 2010 12:20 AM To: geda-u...@seul.org Subject: Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general) Bert Timmerman wrote: Maybe a single button would do to open a popup dialog to alter layer settings. Maybe something like this screenshot from AutoCAD: http://www.xs4all.nl/~ljh4timm/downloads/Layer_properties_manager.jpg There is no much benefit in presenting all the properties of all layers at the same time, squeezed in the available screen space. IMHO, it would be better to open a properties dialog for just one layer at a time. For example triggered by right-click on the corresponding layer button. ---)kaimartin(--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 It's just to give food for thought and insight of how other CAD apps have solved this issue, the pcb-devs are very able to steer their own course. However, for designs with a large number of layers, having a non-modal layers management dialog could be a possibility te keep more screen space available for the drawing area. Not everybody has one (or more) wide flat screen(s) with a resolution 1680 x 1050 and a bazzillion colours. Parts of the contents for this layers management dialog already existst in the Files/Preference... pull down menu, in a dialog with two tabs (and another one for information). Just my EUR 0.02 Kind regards, Bert Timmerman. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Bert Timmerman wrote: However, for designs with a large number of layers, having a non-modal layers management dialog could be a possibility te keep more screen space available for the drawing area. No dialog should be modal, anyway :-) Parts of the contents for this layers management dialog already existst in the Files/Preference... pull down menu, in a dialog with two tabs (and another one for information). Seems we are talking about three different needs here: 1) Layer switching during manual routing 2) Management of the properties of a single layer 3) Management of the layer stack. Number one calls for a permanently visible interface which should be frugal with screen estate. I think, this need is served pretty good by the current GTK-HID layer switcher. Much better than the other two EDA packages I know (eagle and protel). The preference dialog tries to serve number two and number three. I think, it would be better to but all the single layer stuff in a dedicated dialog. A dialog that can be called with a single click on the layer chooser. ---)kaimartin(--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Bert Timmerman wrote: Maybe a single button would do to open a popup dialog to alter layer settings. Maybe something like this screenshot from AutoCAD: http://www.xs4all.nl/~ljh4timm/downloads/Layer_properties_manager.jpg There is no much benefit in presenting all the properties of all layers at the same time, squeezed in the available screen space. IMHO, it would be better to open a properties dialog for just one layer at a time. For example triggered by right-click on the corresponding layer button. ---)kaimartin(--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
John Griessen wrote: When you say shortcuts it sounds like the keybindings for keys to use instead of menu pulldowns. There is an existing mechanism for changing these in pcbmenu.res files in a local project directory. Unfortunately, the GTK internal mechanism of shortcut configuration on the fly works but is not preserved to the next pcb session. ---)kaimartin(--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
i have finally fetched the source from git and rebuilt pcb. the most prominent new feature seems to be the polygon hole mode (which seems to create negative polygons inside polygons essentially). it has no keyboard shortcut assigned. since it is related to polygons i would suggest to assign some modifier (e.g. shift) + F6, what do you think? there was some discussing about adding tooltips with the shortcuts to the tool buttons in the new icon set... thread. are there any concrete plans to implement this? the Btn3 (shift+rightmouse) tools menu also lacks display of these shortcuts. is that intended or just not implemented? shortcuts for enabling/disabling layers is documented, but seems to be broken for me. docs say: ‘ToggleVisibility(Layer)’ Toggles the visibility of the layer. Mod1Key1: ToggleVisibility(1) Mod1 is mapped to alt in gnome afaik, so this should be alt+1? also the command itself does not work if entered via die command line: unknown action `ToggleVisibility'. also i am missing default shortcuts for some things i do _all_ the time while working with pcb: toggling settings/orthogonal moves toggling settings/crosshair snaps to pins and pads toggling settings/autoenforce DRC clearance opening menus (this is alt+some_char_from_the_menu_name in all* pc applications (*all but finitely many ;) why not in pcb?) saving (ok its possible to do this vi-style (:wenter), but assigning ctrl+s would not hurt anyone?) ... and there are so many (useful) commands, that are not visible in the gui at all, like the recently added FreeRotateBuffer(). e.g. MorphPolygon or ChangeClearSize(SelectedPins|SelectedVias, ...). maybe including every command would clutter the menus too much, but having a list of all commands similar to the shortcut list at hand without the manual would be useful imho. the shortcut list should be completed to list all available shortcuts in the program (maybe even those mentioned somewhere else (that would allow easier customization without creating conflicts with existing shortcuts). tab complete for the command line would help also (i think i saw it in some todo in the source tree already). is that all deliberately not included in the gui or would you accept patches? is there any written masterplan for (gui) enhancements? is there interest to debate reorganizing the current menu system + (re)assigning shortcuts at large? i have to admit, that i have not looked into the code a lot and that i don't really have a clue about (gtk) menu programming (yet). i also don't know how much time i want to dedicate to this, but i think pcb's usability, especially to newbies, can easily be improved by some of the things mentioned. i have not looked yet at (the) developer docs/design guidelines if there are any. if there are any not obvious/google-able docs, please advise. (i hate those mails, that start with that tiny question and result in something like this. :) -- Kind regards, Stefan Tauner ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
- Stefan Tauner stefan.tau...@student.tuwien.ac.at wrote: i have finally fetched the source from git and rebuilt pcb. the most prominent new feature seems to be the polygon hole mode (which seems to create negative polygons inside polygons essentially). it has no keyboard shortcut assigned. since it is related to polygons i would suggest to assign some modifier (e.g. shift) + F6, what do you think? there was some discussing about adding tooltips with the shortcuts to the tool buttons in the new icon set... thread. are there any concrete plans to implement this? I have tooltips on my new icon set branch at home. I can make a patch with just the tooltips, if you'd like. shortcuts for enabling/disabling layers is documented, but seems to be broken for me. docs say: ‘ToggleVisibility(Layer)’ Toggles the visibility of the layer. Mod1Key1: ToggleVisibility(1) Mod1 is mapped to alt in gnome afaik, so this should be alt+1? also the command itself does not work if entered via die command line: unknown action `ToggleVisibility'. I have tried enabling the shortcut for this. There is a strange problem with Gtk such that if you toggle the visibility of the currently selected layer, the visibility is not toggled. I hunted after the bug for a few days but didn't get anywhere. So right now in the code there is no keyboard shortcut for this. This problem prompted me to suggest redoing the layer selector entirely to clean up the code, which in turn spawned the workspace/functional block discussion. also i am missing default shortcuts for some things i do _all_ the time while working with pcb: toggling settings/orthogonal moves toggling settings/crosshair snaps to pins and pads toggling settings/autoenforce DRC clearance opening menus (this is alt+some_char_from_the_menu_name in all* pc applications (*all but finitely many ;) why not in pcb?) saving (ok its possible to do this vi-style (:wenter), but assigning ctrl+s would not hurt anyone?) ... I've also done this, but if you take it to its logical conclusion, you should also add Ctrl+O for open, Ctrl+Z/Y for undo/redo, Ctrl+N for new, Ctrl+P for print, Ctrl+A for 'select all', etc. In the end I had to displace a number of existing shortcuts, a move that I didn't expect would be popular among long-term users of the program. Also, I wanted to eventually add the ability to customize shortcuts, which would override my changes anyway. and there are so many (useful) commands, that are not visible in the gui at all, like the recently added FreeRotateBuffer(). e.g. MorphPolygon or ChangeClearSize(SelectedPins|SelectedVias, ...). maybe including every command would clutter the menus too much, but having a list of all commands similar to the shortcut list at hand without the manual would be useful imho. This is a known issue. It comes down to UI design is hard :) if you want to take a crack at it, go for it. Andrew ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Andrew Poelstra wrote: This problem prompted me to suggest redoing the layer selector entirely to clean up the code, which in turn spawned the workspace/functional block discussion. Since you want to do away with the radio buttons left of the layers for activating I suppose you want use left-click for activate (like Kai-Martin every 10th attempt I inadvertently do this anyway). A means to switch visibility must be found: once a right-click popup is assigned to the layer buttons, this would just be one of the properties, until then, how about using right-click or middle-click? Thinking of a way to display the extent of vias (for burried vias) a bar left of the layers showing a bronze color strip connecting the start and end layer makes sense to me. It's similiar to a scrollbar but in reality could consist of simple boxes with changing background color. The active layer could be shown with the corresponding button depressed. Cycling through visibility states can change the button background color: normal ... visible, full saturation darkish grey + bright text . greyed out very dark + bright text .. invisible Getting caught by a fixed start and end layer for vias while routing on a different layer not in that range, it's probably practical to have a setting 'via starts at current layer' - using it may be a tradeoff between manufacturing cost and ease of routing. ( what happens if I want via_1 from layer 2-4 and via_2 from layer 3-5? ok, via_1 probably starts as blind while glueing layer 2,3,4 , 1st metalization, then glueing layer 5 makes via_1 burried, 2nd metalization connects layer 5 with layer 3,4 on via_2 - with multiple drilling, sounds expensive ;-) ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Hi all, -Original Message- From: geda-user-boun...@moria.seul.org [mailto:geda-user-boun...@moria.seul.org] On Behalf Of Armin Faltl Sent: Monday, August 16, 2010 5:16 PM To: gEDA user mailing list Subject: Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general) Andrew Poelstra wrote: This problem prompted me to suggest redoing the layer selector entirely to clean up the code, which in turn spawned the workspace/functional block discussion. Since you want to do away with the radio buttons left of the layers for activating I suppose you want use left-click for activate (like Kai-Martin every 10th attempt I inadvertently do this anyway). A means to switch visibility must be found: once a right-click popup is assigned to the layer buttons, this would just be one of the properties, until then, how about using right-click or middle-click? Thinking of a way to display the extent of vias (for burried vias) a bar left of the layers showing a bronze color strip connecting the start and end layer makes sense to me. It's similiar to a scrollbar but in reality could consist of simple boxes with changing background color. The active layer could be shown with the corresponding button depressed. Cycling through visibility states can change the button background color: normal ... visible, full saturation darkish grey + bright text . greyed out very dark + bright text .. invisible Getting caught by a fixed start and end layer for vias while routing on a different layer not in that range, it's probably practical to have a setting 'via starts at current layer' - using it may be a tradeoff between manufacturing cost and ease of routing. ( what happens if I want via_1 from layer 2-4 and via_2 from layer 3-5? ok, via_1 probably starts as blind while glueing layer 2,3,4 , 1st metalization, then glueing layer 5 makes via_1 burried, 2nd metalization connects layer 5 with layer 3,4 on via_2 - with multiple drilling, sounds expensive ;-) Maybe a single button would do to open a popup dialog to alter layer settings. Maybe something like this screenshot from AutoCAD: http://www.xs4all.nl/~ljh4timm/downloads/Layer_properties_manager.jpg Just the 5 left columns and the right most would do the trick. Regards, Bert Timmerman. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
- Armin Faltl armin.fa...@aon.at wrote: Andrew Poelstra wrote: This problem prompted me to suggest redoing the layer selector entirely to clean up the code, which in turn spawned the workspace/functional block discussion. Since you want to do away with the radio buttons left of the layers for activating I suppose you want use left-click for activate (like Kai-Martin every 10th attempt I inadvertently do this anyway). A means to switch visibility must be found: once a right-click popup is assigned to the layer buttons, this would just be one of the properties, until then, how about using right-click or middle-click? I wanted to copy the GIMP: show icons for visibility/locking as part of the list item, that can be toggled independently of visibility. Right- clicking should pop up a full context menu for creating/editing/deleting layers, geometric transforms, duplicating, etc. As for buried vias, I don't think they should be related to the layer selector at all. Andrew ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Andrew Poelstra wrote: I wanted to copy the GIMP: show icons for visibility/locking as part of the list item, that can be toggled independently of visibility. Right- clicking should pop up a full context menu for creating/editing/deleting layers, geometric transforms, duplicating, etc. As for buried vias, I don't think they should be related to the layer selector at all. I don't like the layer menu of GIMP - it's detached, so I always have to fetch it from below 5 other things before I can use it. If you don't detach it, it's still very wide. I just don't like it. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
- Armin Faltl armin.fa...@aon.at wrote: Andrew Poelstra wrote: I wanted to copy the GIMP: show icons for visibility/locking as part of the list item, that can be toggled independently of visibility. Right- clicking should pop up a full context menu for creating/editing/deleting layers, geometric transforms, duplicating, etc. As for buried vias, I don't think they should be related to the layer selector at all. I don't like the layer menu of GIMP - it's detached, so I always have to fetch it from below 5 other things before I can use it. If you don't detach it, it's still very wide. I just don't like it. There's no good reason for it to be wide - they just like to have giant clickable areas, presumably for usability's sake. Why, then, did they detach it..? I dunno. We could fit the same functionality into the same space as the current layer switcher. (Or, if we used more vertical space below the layer name, we could also add trace/via width info alongside the visibility button.) Andrew ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
Andrew Poelstra wrote: Really? I had been recompiling every time I changed that file :-}. Yes, it works without recompiling. A restart may be needed. PCB still has not got much interprocess communication going on... some with dbus maybe... Are you going to put your code up on a git repository for testing? I'll make some time to test. JG ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
- John Griessen j...@ecosensory.com wrote: Andrew Poelstra wrote: Really? I had been recompiling every time I changed that file :-}. Yes, it works without recompiling. A restart may be needed. PCB still has not got much interprocess communication going on... some with dbus maybe... Are you going to put your code up on a git repository for testing? I'll make some time to test. Yep, when I've got testable code ;) Gtk has a few tricks up its sleeve to trip up newbies to GUI development. Andrew ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
is that all deliberately not included in the gui or would you accept patches? is there any written masterplan for (gui) enhancements? is there interest to debate reorganizing the current menu system + (re)assigning shortcuts at large? None of PCB's shortcomings are deliberate; we just don't have a lot of manpower to actually do things. Check out the GUI section of: http://geda.seul.org/wiki/geda:pcb_funding_sow ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
I also like the GIMP's way of doing things - big button is select/activate, side buttons for visibility/lock/whatever. To save space, perhaps the big buttons could be only partially shown, as if they were hidden behind the PCB? When you hover over them, they'd move to the front so you can see the whole name... ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: pcb keyboard shortcuts (and usability in general)
DJ Delorie wrote: I also like the GIMP's way of doing things Gimp is good by me. I also like the UI of inkscape. From this: http://wiki.inkscape.org/wiki/index.php/Class_Inkscape::UI::Widget::ProgressPannel it looks like c++ code and not sure what toolkit. If you have an easy way to install inkscape and play with it, it's got good GUI for examples. JG ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
