Re: [LAD] A GUI request
On Tue, 7 Jun 2022 00:06:08 +0200 Fons Adriaensen wrote: > Simple fact is that all popular GUI toolsets are targeted to developing > 'office' > or 'social' type of applications and completely fail to address the needs for > anything outside that limited scope. There is much more to this than just the > choice of colors. Indeed. It’s a shame, as office-type applications could benefit from higher standards of providing information at a glance and efficient means of control (even at the cost of being less obvious). > I've been involved in creating displays used in aircraft cockpits and similar > technical environments. Almost all of the 'standard' GUI design guidelines > (as advocated by 'computer science' academics) have been shown to be either > irrelevant or just plain wrong for such applications. That probably includes > graphical interfaces for pro-audio systems. So far I thought the differences are all about much higher requirements on readability at a glance and stableness. More contrast, avoiding superfluous styling, no deep layering. Being able to rely on training much more. Fons, do you have examples of such guidelines that don‘t work for cockpits, that may surprise the layman? -- Thorsten Wilms ___ Linux-audio-dev mailing list Linux-audio-dev@lists.linuxaudio.org https://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
Re: [LAD] A GUI request
On Sun, Jun 05, 2022 at 09:49:13PM +0100, Will Godfrey wrote:
> As a {cough} sprightly 73 year old I'm starting to have sight difficulties -
> especially dark colours and night vision. With the current trend of dark GUI
> shades this presents me with a problem when using new software. Some, but not
> all of these programs do provide alternatives. However they default to dark,
> and
> I have a hard time finding how to change this, or indeed, even seeing which
> options are available.
Being a few but not so much years younger I do understand the problems you
may have. But I don't think the essence of this can be simplified to 'light'
vs 'dark' themes. There are good reasons for having dark themes - working in
a dark environment like a concert being the most evident one.
Even a dark theme can be perfectly readable if designed well. This may involve
more than just changing the colors of a light one. For example, you'll probably
need 'bolder' fonts as well. And the background should never be completely black
but provide an amount of brightness that allows your eyes to adjust to it. It
is the inability of your vision to adjust that makes many dark themes hard to
use.
Simple fact is that all popular GUI toolsets are targeted to developing 'office'
or 'social' type of applications and completely fail to address the needs for
anything outside that limited scope. There is much more to this than just the
choice of colors.
I've been involved in creating displays used in aircraft cockpits and similar
technical environments. Almost all of the 'standard' GUI design guidelines
(as advocated by 'computer science' academics) have been shown to be either
irrelevant or just plain wrong for such applications. That probably includes
graphical interfaces for pro-audio systems.
Ciao,
--
FA
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Re: [LAD] A GUI request
Le Sun, 5 Jun 2022 21:49:13 +0100, Will Godfrey a écrit : > Therefore please consider either defaulting to a lighter layout, or > alternatively, at first time start give a choice using a system > alert/choice window. If you don't provide a lighter option, maybe > consider doing so. > Personally, I prefer dark themes but I understand very well Will's issue. I face a similar issue with small font sizes, they are just unreadable for me on a high definition screen. Accessibility is a very serious issue for a software to be usable by as many people than possible. As example, half of the African population cannot read text, which imply most software are just of no use for them. But, if a GUI include some text fields, please make them readable by anybody by providing some kind of font preferences. If that preference, or the theme preferences, are made by some config file or with environmental variables, please advertise about it into the documentation. Cheers, Dominique ___ Linux-audio-dev mailing list Linux-audio-dev@lists.linuxaudio.org https://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-dev
