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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2018 7:17 pm 
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winstep wrote:
Ok, the question then becomes:

Should memory used for icons, for instance, be shown all together (i.e.; sum of memory used for all icons in all docks, Shelves, etc) or should it be discriminated by dock, Shelf, etc?


i think discriminated by individual docks/shelves would be more useful for troubleshooting


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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Tue Jul 31, 2018 7:34 pm 
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seeker wrote:
i think discriminated by individual docks/shelves would be more useful for troubleshooting


I think so, too... :)

Anyway, I think we are ready for a public beta? The code seems to be robust enough now, with no apparent glaring issues.

v18.7 is gone now though, so long live v18.8! :)

There is only one thing getting on my nerves at this point: when adding items to a Shelf via drag & drop, the very first icon NEVER shifts to make room for a new entry BEFORE it. This is not a bug, but it's kind of wrong none-the-less - the problem is that the code for icon shifting is VERY complicated and was built on the assumption that the first icon would not shift, so changing this behavior will be a real PITA.

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 1:44 am 
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winstep wrote:
Ok, the question then becomes:

Should memory used for icons, for instance, be shown all together (i.e.; sum of memory used for all icons in all docks, Shelves, etc) or should it be discriminated by dock, Shelf, etc?

Total in all docks, shelves etc. makes sense - less is more. :)

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 2:02 am 
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winstep wrote:
seeker wrote:
i think discriminated by individual docks/shelves would be more useful for troubleshooting

I think so, too... :)

I beg to differ - can't really see how the minutiae of memory used for each individual dock etc. can be of any real value to the user. (Unless it may possibly be useful for the developer, but even that I find rather hard to see.) For my liking it becomes too anally retentive. ;)
winstep wrote:
Anyway, I think we are ready for a public beta? The code seems to be robust enough now, with no apparent glaring issues.

v18.7 is gone now though, so long live v18.8! :)

Bring it on Jorge, as seems to be the popular phrase these days. :) 18.7, 18.8 - who's counting? :P

Have you looked into the proplem of the non-appearance of the mouse-over image on the shelf hide and esp. prefs icons though btw?
winstep wrote:
There is only one thing getting on my nerves at this point: when adding items to a Shelf via drag & drop, the very first icon NEVER shifts to make room for a new entry BEFORE it. This is not a bug, but it's kind of wrong none-the-less - the problem is that the code for icon shifting is VERY complicated and was built on the assumption that the first icon would not shift, so changing this behavior will be a real PITA.

It is an irritation, but a very minor one I find. I can live with it, quite happily at that. So why bother with what would be a real PITA to change?

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 5:37 am 
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winstep wrote:

Quote:
And we have a winner! Replicated and fixed, thank you! :)


You are welcome!

winstep wrote:

Quote:
This is again the type of bug that only seems to happen with a specific combination of settings...

Vlad, I suspect it might have something to do with hotspots, since you said you experienced problems with those before. Care to make a backup of your NextSTART settings and then experiment a bit to see if we can get a lead?



I`ll try to retrace my steps and see what I can come up with...


winstep wrote:

Quote:
Ok, the question then becomes:

Should memory used for icons, for instance, be shown all together (i.e.; sum of memory used for all icons in all docks, Shelves, etc) or should it be discriminated by dock, Shelf, etc?


I tend to agree to the idea that having too much information can lead to ignoring it all together. So sum of all sounds better. You can still make a more button option...


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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 4:24 pm 
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Vlad wrote:
winstep wrote:
Quote:
Ok, the question then becomes:

Should memory used for icons, for instance, be shown all together (i.e.; sum of memory used for all icons in all docks, Shelves, etc) or should it be discriminated by dock, Shelf, etc?

I tend to agree to the idea that having too much information can lead to ignoring it all together. So sum of all sounds better. You can still make a more button option...

Well said Vlad! Too much info often if not always is not a good thing. As it is we live in an age of total info overload. (As well as choice overload, and.... and.... and....)

Jorge, I want to come back to your comment re: skinners rarely if ever including a digital in-shelf/-dock clock for a moment, if I may. You may remember that right from the beginning of Workshelf its lack of flexibility was a fair irritation and frustration to me. And it still is.

Up till now, all the skinner can do is provide a background bitmap and specify a colour for the time display (which doesn't even get saved with the theme it would seem). I suspect that this is another reason why you see so few digital in-shelf clocks. It's fine for a strictly NeXT-style clock (if not quite the same), but for most purposes and themes it just won't and doesn't do.

In the below shot, on the left is what we can do now - not very inspiring and not particularly well matched to the theme. On the right is a mock-up of what we ought to be able to do as skinners. We should be able to choose any and all of the three strands of information shown, i.e., time, day, date, in whatever format we wish, in any order we wish, each capable of having font, font size and colour specified.

The example shown is just a very basic one and only one of a myriad of possible permutations of course.

Now I realise this could not be changed for the presently worked on release, but wouldn't it be possible to have this sometime? Please? If at all possible?
Attachment:
WsClockD-wExample.png
WsClockD-wExample.png [ 4.94 KiB | Viewed 13823 times ]

Similarly, there is a problem for the average skinner to provide their own in-shelf as well as desktop recycler anims in that there is little information on how to accomplish this, and I can't say I've come across a single theme that provides either. Granted, the in-shelf anim is simple enough to do and anybody should be able to figure it out, and I certainly can and have easily. The desktop one is more of a challenge - all the old user guide refers to is that you can add a WsTrashAnim.png. There is no info on how large/small the images can be, how many frames are required or if we can use any number of them, what order scheme they should follow (i.e., e.g., same as the in-shelf (which I presume to be the ES, 1, 2, 3, 4, D, FS files in that order) or something else, or whether the images should be immediately adjoining one another or a gap (and if so how large a one) should be left in betweeen. Nor is there any info on what needs to be added to the ThisTheme.wsw config file to make it work.

Personally, I have the in-shelf custom anim working just fine and have one in just about all my own themes (with two new anims/trash images in development), but without more info I am unable to go ahead with desktop recycler anims.

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 6:06 pm 
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nexter wrote:
On the right is a mock-up of what we ought to be able to do as skinners. We should be able to choose any and all of the three strands of information shown, i.e., time, day, date, in whatever format we wish, in any order we wish, each capable of having font, font size and colour specified.


See? This is precisely what I do NOT want.

Ric, you're thinking only in terms of your needs. :) I'm thinking in terms of everyone's needs for an iconic digital clock module.

All you have to do to fully understand what I mean is reduce those example digital clocks to 16x16 images, or even 32x32 images. The text becomes *completely* unreadable.

If I let skinners do what you want, soon we would be having dock themes, etc, with iconic digital clocks that are simply impossible to read because most people running the free version of the Nexus dock are filling their docks to the very brink and thus forcing to the dock to automatically reduce icon size to the very minimum.

Even the default NeXT style digital clock already suffers from this issue, which is exactly why I added a much more readable alternative digital style (Clock Settings -> Show Time Only).

This way at least I'm limiting how much skinners can shoot others in the foot.

Free form skinning is reserved for desktop modules only. There you can have as much freedom as you want.

nexter wrote:
Personally, I have the in-shelf custom anim working just fine and have one in just about all my own themes (with two new anims/trash images in development), but without more info I am unable to go ahead with desktop recycler anims.


It's quite simple, actually: you cannot make the *background* of the recycler module animate. What you can do is set the Recycler Desktop Module to display the Recycler module *icon*, and THAT is what animates based on the custom animation for the iconic recycler module.

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 6:08 pm 
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Anyway, public beta of Xtreme, Nexus Ultimate and Nexus v18.8 released. :)

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Wed Aug 01, 2018 7:41 pm 
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Ok, bugs fixed AFTER the public beta:

1. A Drawer docked to the left edge (for instance) would not auto-hide if I moved the mouse pointer below or above it, it would only auto-hide when I moved the mouse pointer into the screen area AFTER the tab/horizontal end of the Drawer.

This also affected Shelves that were not set to full screen width.

2. The Position combo box for Shelves and Drawers in the Docks & Shelves tab in Preferences did not have all the (new) possible options.

3. Fixed Windows Accent Color hot track not previewing properly in the Dock's Theme Preview window.

One thing regarding Drawers: I think they are at their best if you enable mouse over activation (Drawer Properties -> Behavior tab -> Activation Settings)

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 3:53 am 
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winstep wrote:
nexter wrote:
On the right is a mock-up of what we ought to be able to do as skinners. We should be able to choose any and all of the three strands of information shown, i.e., time, day, date, in whatever format we wish, in any order we wish, each capable of having font, font size and colour specified.


See? This is precisely what I do NOT want.

Ric, you're thinking only in terms of your needs. :) I'm thinking in terms of everyone's needs for an iconic digital clock module.

And that is precisely why skinners don't bother with it Jorge - might as well leave it with the default icon and concentrate on the analogue version instead. (Wouldn't be quite so bad if at least it *was* an authentic NeXT clock, I suppose, and even then....)
winstep wrote:
All you have to do to fully understand what I mean is reduce those example digital clocks to 16x16 images, or even 32x32 images. The text becomes *completely* unreadable.

If I let skinners do what you want, soon we would be having dock themes, etc, with iconic digital clocks that are simply impossible to read because most people running the free version of the Nexus dock are filling their docks to the very brink and thus forcing to the dock to automatically reduce icon size to the very minimum.

So for the sake of the freebie users of NeXus who end up with 16px icons at which size *no* iconised clock is readable anyway (and I doubt many paying users would fill up their docks in that fashion), the rest of us, users as well as skinners (if we can be bothered at all) have to put up with something that looks totally out of place in the majority of themes today. (Yes, I know there are still a few folks who use SVGA, but just how many?) Small icons - with very few exceptions such as the sys tray - simply should never have had any place in the desktop environment since at least XP and really ought to be actively discouraged. So, if these users with absurd amounts of icons in their docks can't read a digital clock icon in a given theme, that's just hard cheese, let them use another theme that suits their needs or either use less icons or pay up. (I'd hate to think of any of my themes being used in such a manner - completely destroys the whole design.) And to be sure, I find even the default at 64 or 48px almost impossible to read, the time anyway. Freedom in the design of the iconised digital clock would on the contrary enable designs that are more readable, at least at normal icon sizes such as 48px and up - which surely would apply to the majority of users today. Besides, users always have the option of using the default and disregarding the theme's icon.
winstep wrote:
Even the default NeXT style digital clock already suffers from this issue, which is exactly why I added a much more readable alternative digital style (Clock Settings -> Show Time Only).

This way at least I'm limiting how much skinners can shoot others in the foot.

I find the 'time only' alternative even harder to read - mainly on account of its LED-style matrix design.

As for skinners shooting others in the foot, let's not forget that skinners (at least once) contributed a good deal to the success of Winstep. Skinners should have full creative freedom, within the bounds of what is possible to implement, regardless of what some users might expect or need etc. - users always have the choice to use another theme. That is more than enough choice for them, and there would be plenty more I'm sure if skinning was as easy as it once was. Putting constraints on skinners' freedom and creativity - as well as distorting themes in the default install config so that users don't get to see them and use them as they're intended by the skinner - can easily defeat the whole exercise and de-motivate skinners.
winstep wrote:
Free form skinning is reserved for desktop modules only. There you can have as much freedom as you want.

Well, that's a pity - see above. There's tons of freedom in e.g. the iconised recycler/trash mod - there's nothing stopping me designing my own version/s (which is exactly what I'm doing) of this or modifying existing ones Jorge, so I really don't understand why this can't apply to other iconised mods.
winstep wrote:
nexter wrote:
Personally, I have the in-shelf custom anim working just fine and have one in just about all my own themes (with two new anims/trash images in development), but without more info I am unable to go ahead with desktop recycler anims.

It's quite simple, actually: you cannot make the *background* of the recycler module animate. What you can do is set the Recycler Desktop Module to display the Recycler module *icon*, and THAT is what animates based on the custom animation for the iconic recycler module.

Yes Jorge, I am well aware that one, obviously, cannot animate the desktop background of the recycler. What I lack is any real info on how exactly to put this custom desktop recycler anim together and how to configure it in the wsr file, as stated in my previous post. If I did, sure enough it would be simple enough, after all I've done plenty of anims in other contexts before. (And I have yet to see any theme out there that actually has a custom animated desktop recycler/trash.)

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 4:04 am 
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winstep wrote:
Ok, bugs fixed AFTER the public beta:

1. A Drawer docked to the left edge (for instance) would not auto-hide if I moved the mouse pointer below or above it, it would only auto-hide when I moved the mouse pointer into the screen area AFTER the tab/horizontal end of the Drawer.

This also affected Shelves that were not set to full screen width.

2. The Position combo box for Shelves and Drawers in the Docks & Shelves tab in Preferences did not have all the (new) possible options.

One thing regarding Drawers: I think they are at their best if you enable mouse over activation (Drawer Properties -> Behavior tab -> Activation Settings)

Beta up and running and above noted. As for m-o activation of drawers, that's driven me half nuts actually. ;) So firmly disabled here and now have them free-floating only anyway. They just kept popping up when not wanted.

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 4:22 am 
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nexter wrote:
What I lack is any real info on how exactly to put this custom desktop recycler anim together and how to configure it in the wsr file, as stated in my previous post. If I did, sure enough it would be simple enough, after all I've done plenty of anims in other contexts before. (And I have yet to see any theme out there that actually has a custom animated desktop recycler/trash.)


I've seen a couple before - don't remember their names though - but I think they were all based on the old separate .ICO file method. Anyway:

Animation file: WsTrashAni.png

Settings:

TrashCustomAnimation=True
TrashNoFrames=<no of frames of animation>
TrashFrameInterval=<interval in ms between frames>

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 10:31 am 
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Out of interest how easy would it be to have the dock placed vertical and behave like the one on Ubuntu where the dock and icons remain a fixed width and you scroll through the opened apps instead of the icons getting smaller.


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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 11:06 am 
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neoian1277 wrote:
Out of interest how easy would it be to have the dock placed vertical and behave like the one on Ubuntu where the dock and icons remain a fixed width and you scroll through the opened apps instead of the icons getting smaller.


You basically just described the new Drawers.

A dock with scroll buttons is not a 'dock', by the way, but something else entirely different. :)

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 Post subject: Re: So, what's next after v18.5?
PostPosted: Thu Aug 02, 2018 3:55 pm 
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winstep wrote:
nexter wrote:
What I lack is any real info on how exactly to put this custom desktop recycler anim together and how to configure it in the wsr file, as stated in my previous post. If I did, sure enough it would be simple enough, after all I've done plenty of anims in other contexts before. (And I have yet to see any theme out there that actually has a custom animated desktop recycler/trash.)

I've seen a couple before - don't remember their names though - but I think they were all based on the old separate .ICO file method. Anyway:

Animation file: WsTrashAni.png

Settings:

TrashCustomAnimation=True
TrashNoFrames=<no of frames of animation>
TrashFrameInterval=<interval in ms between frames>

Thanks Jorge, that's a start! :) Now the questions remaining are:
1) Does the custom DT anim have to have the same image size as the iconised one? Or can it be independent of this?

2) what kind of scheme does the anim follow - would it be similar to the (separate icon) iconised (in-shelf) one, which I would guess takes the order WsTrashES.*, *1.*, *2.*, *3.*, *4.*, *D.* and finally ends on *FS.*? (From what you say above I would gather the actual number of frames can be varied, of course.)

3) Should the frames all be joined up (i.e., i create a canvas the same height as the individual icons and the exact width of the total number of frames and copy the icons into this one next to the other and the anim routine assumes a square icon format based on the height or something like that), or should there be some kind of break or interval in between the frames and if so, what?

That's about it. Once I knew the answers, I could be away. :)

As for the old separate .ico file method, that always was (and still is, though we can now use .png or .tif) only for the in-shelf, iconised recycler, and even then I don't recall anybody (other than myself and possibly John) making use of it in the old days. And certainly among the themes on WC I haven't seen more than perhaps one or two older ones using even this, and none with a custom DT recycler anim. Of course, the iconised, in-shelf/-dock anim with the separate icon files is working just fine here and so far every one of my themes has one.

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