Yes, that's what I meant, it would be for the current mode, and would
change based on what you are doing. It would also be hide-able so that
advanced users get the screen real estate back.
There are no problems with combined modifiers, you just list each action
in a different box. In fact, you could even have the modifiers change
the box, so when you hold down the Ctrl key, it shows you exactly what
will happen when you do various things with it held down
Maybe once I have some more things done off my to-do list I will spend
some more time making a mockup of this.
Best,
Jon
On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 9:02 AM, Kristoffer Ödmark
<kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx <mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>> wrote:
Yes, you are correct, but putting the buttons and their function in
the same box would get problems with combined modifiers shift+ctrl
options etc.
But I was thinking of only showing current mode and not all possible
modes at the same time. Mostly you would learn them anyway kinda
quick, you would only need to know they can be learned. by
indicating which buttons are available as modifiers in this tool.
On 03/15/2017 02:54 PM, Jon Evans wrote:
Hi Kristoffer,
I didn't show in my mockup, but you could easily use a UI like
this to
show modifier keys info as well.
-Jon
On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 8:36 AM, Kristoffer Ödmark
<kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>>> wrote:
Hello Jon,
I do not think that the hotkeys are a problem. The
right-click menu
shows how they are bound already and the right click menu is
adaptable. I personally like the way that works a lot.
It is more a problem regarding the modifiers, Ie buttons
that must
be held while doing something, they are not selecting stuff, but
modifiying already existing functionality, usually slightly.
- Kristoffer
On 03/15/2017 02:29 PM, Jon Evans wrote:
Hi Kristoffer, John,
I agree this is an important problem to solve.
I am not convinced that this is the perfect solution, but I
wanted to
share a way a commercial tool does it.
Here's a screenshot from Mentor Graphics Xpedition
showing what
I mean:
http://i.imgur.com/H0wDK0F.png
At the bottom of the screen is a list of keyboard shortcuts,
that change
based on what you are doing. So, when you are in "place
components"
mode the list is different than if you are routing a
track, for
example. The developers chose the most common things to
do for each
"tool" that can be active, and assigned them to
function-keys.
Note that in Xpedition, the hotkeys themselves change,
i.e. the
icons on
the bottom of the screen always correspond to the
function keys
F1-F12.
But, even without adopting that scheme (which would conflict
with some
of our existing hotkeys), we could use the UI concept of a
larger "quick
reference" to hotkeys (I'm including mouse actions in the
definition of
hotkeys here) at the bottom of the screen, for example a
quick
mockup:
http://i.imgur.com/wB0Yecy.png
Then we would just need to define up to N hotkeys for
each tool
/ tool
mode that should be hinted to the user. (Where N is some
number that
looks not too cramped)
-Jon
On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 7:11 AM, Kristoffer Ödmark
<kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>>>> wrote:
Yes, the status line is way to small it. However it
could
maybe be
used to show which modifiers are in use. Not what
they do.
I believe that knowing which modifiers are in use
would be
enough,
because many modifiers would probably be very self
explanatory once
activated, for example the angle-snap, having a grid
snap etc.
Then the idea of having an explanatory panel
available somehow
on-demand would probably be best.
Attached is an idea mockup for putting on the left
side in the
status line.
It shows when the arc tool is active and has ctrl
and shift
modifers
where ctrl is currently held and angle snap-active.
On 03/15/2017 12:11 PM, John Beard wrote:
Hi Kristoffer,
I agree that the "secrecy" of KiCad shortcuts is a
pretty major
issue.
It serves to make people good at KiCad think
it's great,
while new
users struggle (probably in silence) because
they don't know
there's a
better way.
Expanding documentation is important here (he
says, not
having
documented his new features yet) but it's
unreasonable
to expect
users
to wade through hundreds of screens of prose to
be told
incidentally
that the arc tool snaps angles when you hold
control.
I certainly think some sort of easily accessible
(at minimum
hotkey +
some sort of obvious visual affordance) method for a
user to get
contextual help is very important. Ideally something
that doesn't
break the user's flow. Popping a dialog that you
have to
dismiss
is a
little clunky, I feel. Perhaps some sort of
panel that
appears only
while you're holding a key down?
I'm not a huge fan of the Inkscape-style status
line,
though it's
certainly better than nothing. It feels squeezed
to me,
since the
information is really more like a list of possible
modifiers than a
one-liner. We do have a little area of the
status bar
that tells you
what tool you're in, but that's nowhere near big
enough
to naively
plonk screeds of text.
tl;dr agree but no ideas yet!
Cheers,
John
On Wed, Mar 15, 2017 at 6:34 PM, Kristoffer Ödmark
<kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx
<mailto:kristofferodmark90@xxxxxxxxx>>>> wrote:
Hello all!
I just wanted to highlight an emerging
problem to
catch it
in its cradle.
The new tool and dialog patches that has
been merged are
great. But they
also introduce secret functionaly, examples:
Ctrl + click: highlights net ( modifier to
select
tool )
ctrl + drag: snap angles in arc tool
shift + click: adds/removes to selection in
select mode
shift + scroll: changes increment values in
3d-previewer
These are the few examples I found right
now, what I
would
like to see is a
standardized way of informing the users to this
before more
tools get these
hidden functionality.
The way that current shortcuts are indicated
I think are
great ( the grey
text next to their selection in menus Maybe
we could
expand
on this to
create tooltips to the menus with a list of
modifier
keys
for the hovered
tool in the menu.
Another way that Gimp uses is to put this
information at the
bottom
information bar, Maybe we could do that as
well by
modifying
the current
position information bar
Yet another way would be to have tool
specific settings
given screen
real-estate, much in the way of gimp and
inkscape.
At least I think this issue should be
addressed and
agreed
upon before tools
specify their different modifiers
willy-nilly all
over the
place and you
need a kicad-phd to remember them all. Just
having
an idea
on how to do it
can enable a good team-effort of supporting it.
--
-Kristoffer
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