Possibly... the bar color for sure.

In the mean time asked ChatGPT to throw around some concepts based on what I told him, here is some of the stuff he came up with for dark/light and horizontal/vertical disk monitor desktop module modes.

One thing I actually like (check next post since we can only have 4 attachments per post) is the idea of having some action buttons in the module itself (e.g. add more drives, and buttons that would change the module's orientation, horizontal, vertical and a 3rd option being available, grid.

Check the next post for a couple of CoPilot suggestions too.

A couple of other suggestions, the third one with a grid layout option.

The 3rd and 4th options are actually based on the current calendar desktop module options (dark & light).

Something else I am thinking about: instead of simply deleting orphan sub-docks, grid stacks, etc, it would probably be better to create a new "Lost" Shelf and add all the orphaned stuff to it. A bit like it happens with CHKDSK /F, so there would be no data loss.

Where to start?

It is difficult to comment on some of this without considering scale.

I like the format of the first set of drives as it appears to use less screen real estate (again this may be because the image is shrunken in comparison to the others), although I still think you can use the drive shell rather than the simple pie. This may be configurable, or just a matter of preference.

I would make the Temp / data rates optional as these will require more CPU time to keep updating. Possibly even make the update rate configurable so that the user can decide how much of their processor time they want to commit to this.

If you are going to use a simple pie then you may as well place the drive letter in the centre as that will free up an information line - again reducing screen real estate usage.

In terms of the drive shell approach - I like the drive letter on top of the shell (sloped as is), but at this point also providing the drive letter alongside becomes redundant.

I realise that these are examples but the structure keeps changing from amount of space used, to amount of space available. Need to decide on one, or make it configurable.

Personally I like the dark (Black / slightly less black / dark grey?) background for the drive modules, even though I don't necessarily use dark mode on my desktop.


I like the copper shell - can we just modify the icon ourselves as part of the theme if you don't provide that level of configurability directly?


If you are going to provide the 3 dots at the top right to allow customisation then I'm not sure it is necessary to add more buttons - but that may just be my minimalistic leanings .

What is the bit in the top right corner of the graphic that displays Hstack and Vstack meant to represent?

Just some thoughts / preferences.

Maybe - provided that it doesn't confuse things.

Will this be a separate shelf that can be enabled from preferences when troubleshooting, or a tab (sub-shelf or whatever) on your current shelf (assuming there is something to put in it)?

Not sure that I would want it cluttering up my normal shelf unless I was troubleshooting.

What operations do you foresee being able to be performed on items in there?

It could be useful if you have moved your only shortcut into a 'container' that subsequently became orphaned - however I think that most people would be able to recreate the shortcut from the OS if necessary.

Try at the beginning.



CPU usage for this would be pretty much meaningless as it would be a single call every second UNLESS you enable the LED blinking option. If you do the latter, then poll rates go from once per second to once per 100 ms (increase tenfold).

So, basically three possible poll/CPU usage levels: no read/write per sec info, pretty much static, read/write info, once per second, activity led, 10 times per second.



Those are just random mockups. Whether a pie or a drive cage is used for the drive icon will depend on the module style you have selected for the disk monitor module.



Nearly all modules provide this ability, except the Weather module (Preferences -> Modules tab -> Change Icon). This allows you to provide a customized "background" bitmap. You just have to be careful that the shape remains basically the same because of any data that might be overlapped later onto this icon.



Oh, I didn't ask for that, the AI decided to add those buttons as well as the dots. But if we are going minimalistic, then neither buttons nor dots are required, as you can simply right click...

...on the other hand not everyone will figure out that you can right click, and it is handy to have those options first level.



No idea. Didn't ask ChatGPT for it lol

Remember, these are AI provided mockups based solely on a handful of directions. AI likes to make things up as it goes lol

Meant to say that I had dragged a set of shortcuts from the desktop and tried to drop them on a sub-dock icon, a grid stack icon, and a launch pad icon (separately of course) - in each case the items were added to the parent shelf not the icons dock / stack.

Ok but the ability to have the drive letter in the centre of the pie is still valid.

Agreed which is why I think that the 3 dots is reasonable, and doesn't use much space.

Ok, turns out all those grid stacks / launch pads are legit (and they are only that many because of the duplication needed to "resolve" cross-linked Grid Stacks, which in turn only happened because I missed duplicating them properly in the beta in the first place). I couldn't see them because they were hosted by the Main Shelf which was disabled. Once I enabled it I spotted them all in the Tests tab.



I'm thinking a separate single tabbed Shelf, perhaps, created "on the spot"?



What do you mean?



Imagine you created a nice structure of nested shelves, docks, grid stacks, etc, and then it subsequently becomes orphaned for whatever reason (it should never happens, but, as you can see, it did in your case because I forgot to add some duplication code when I added grid stacks and then launch pads). If it's a complex structure, you will be thanking all mighty God in Heaven if the Check Integrity feature actually recovers it instead of deleting it oblivion as it does now.

Yes thats my naming issue - the 'Main' shelf isn't the one I normally use. I just pull it up for testing, so had disabled it when finished.


I think that that is reasonable provided that it is initially disabled with a dialog box telling you that it is there (and how to enable it). Alternatively you might get away with an enabled Floating-Horizontal shelf. Actually in all cases I think that it should be Floating-Horizontal, to ensure that it has least chance of overlaying one of the users other shelves.


Can you move / copy the structure back into one of your other shelves (presumably the one it became orphaned from)? Will this be entire / partial?
I assume that you will just be using standard shelf properties?


Agreed, but I also may be thinking that something I'd added / organised had caused the software to glitch (possibly reached a limit, or a bug) - so would be cautious about adding it back into the operational shelf in case it did it again, but maybe worse this time.

That is exactly what I was thinking. A special "one of a kind" type of Shelf named "Recovered Items", is created ONLY if orphaned items are found and appears in the middle of the screen as a floating shelf once the integrity check completes (with some text on the completion dialog explaining what it is). Once created the user can delete or disable it, but if more orphaned items are found at a later pass the shelf will either be recreated or re-enabled.



That is the idea. In this respect it acts just like any other shelf.



I could, but I want to go one step further for the sake of attention to detail and make the Recovery Shelf a "special" Shelf. It acts like any other Shelf would in most things, but it is single tab, you cannot add or delete tabs to or from it, you cannot rename it, you cannot change its type, and you cannot add items to it.



Normally a glitch like this would be the result of a bad move/copy operation (as was in your case due to a bug in the code) and more so, assuming these bugs have been corrected, it is something that you should rarely see, if ever.

But, if it does happen, again it is just like CHKDSK /F, at least it gives the user the chance to recover their data (the alternative is much worse).

This is AI, and getting AI to do anything useful, in a nutshell. Long video but well worth to watch - and companies are firing developers for THIS?!

Crash and burn, my friend, crash and burn!

> I lost the engine!

You're doing fine!

> I lost the wings!

Absolutely! Don't worry I'll tell you what to do when we hit the ground, I am here to help you out the best I can, relax and take a deep breath. You're doing great!

If the user decides to disable it with the orphaned items still present, and then it subsequently is re-enabled by finding more orphaned items, will these be added to the existing recovery shelf or replace it?

If items are to be added will these be distinguished from the previous?

Added.



You shall know them by their fruits... errr, content. That is up to the user originally identifying their grid stacks etc, or keeping the default names.

Like the FILE0001.CHK, FILE0002.CHK, etc of CHKDSK /F, open them up to see what data they contain lol

And here you go: