Re: GUI style question
Re: GUI style question
- Subject: Re: GUI style question
- From: Dustin Voss <email@hidden>
- Date: Fri, 18 Oct 2002 20:25:37 -0700
On Tuesday, October 15, 2002, at 09:20 PM, Nicholas Francis wrote:
Hi guys.
I'm working on an editor that wraps a large 3D engine, and have a
problem i.r.t. placing commands.
The problem stems from the fact that there are A LOT of commands
(Project Builder go home :-). I can't insert them all into the main
menu.
Only a - relatively - small amount of actions are available at one
time, however (depending of where the first responder is).
E.g. if the Material Editor has focus, there are Create Material,
Delete MAterial, Import Shader, Delete Shader, etc..
So far, I have stuck them in a toolbar in the material editor, but
this will not scale. What is the correct style for this problem?
Should I create an 'Object' submenu and switch its contents? Shall I
rename this menu item to represent the focus (e.g. change it into
'Materials')?
Well, these commands should definitely go into menus. I see two ways of
organizing them:
1) Have a menu for each editor, but only show one of them at a time. If
you leave the other menus in the menu bar but hidden, their keyboard
shortcuts may still be usable.
2) Consider organizing your menus by verb instead of noun. For example,
instead of "Materials" and "Models" menus, use a "Create" or "Delete"
menu. You have to look at the commands your program supports. Divide
each into a verb and noun. If you have a handful of verbs that apply to
a large number of nouns, you want the nouns to be in the menu, where
there's lots of vertical space. This exercise will also come in handy
if you want to make your app scriptable.
Interestingly, the old HIG recommended using verbs as menu titles. Of
course, no one does that anymore, but I try to. I find it forces me to
think about the app's design more thoroughly, and makes the UI seems
easier.
Here's an idea that occurs to me, though it may not be good UI:
Consider a command drawer. A drawer can attach to a specific window,
and only include commands applicable to that window. It can have a
scroll bar or outline view to organize commands. Each command can be a
button that looks and acts like a menu item, or maybe a bevel button.
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