Re: ANN: Geometer AU
Re: ANN: Geometer AU
- Subject: Re: ANN: Geometer AU
- From: Marc Poirier <email@hidden>
- Date: Wed, 27 Nov 2002 20:28:34 +0100 (CET)
For what it's worth, I did think about this issue for a little while last
night and here are my thoughts, for anyone who's interested in hearing
them:
It seems obvious that if a parameter is not readable and also not
writable, then it definitely should not be displayed in a generic GUI.
What is not as obvious is what to do if a parameter is readable but not
writable, or writable but not readable.
So imagine that a parameter is writable but not readable. How exactly is
such a thing represented? Is there a slider but no value display? Or is
even showing the slider position giving away too much secret information?
But if a user can set a value (because it's writable), then she has at
least some notion of what the value is after setting it, so the idea of
the parameter being unreadable is kind of bogus. The only truly writable
but not readable system I can think of is where you could randomize a
parameter value, but not know what the outcome is.
Now imagine a parameter that is readable but not writable. This is
simpler to conceptualize. The parameter values are shown to the user, but
the user is given no means to alter them. The values are locked. But if
the values are unchangeable, then what the hell does the user care about
what the values are? They might as well not be shown. They're only
useful internally to the plugin itself, no one else cares about them.
So my conclusion was that the writable attribute is the only one that's
really significant. If the parameter is writable, then the user will want
to twiddle it, if not, then no one cares about it. So I think that the
behaviour of Apple's generic AUView (to show or not show a parameter based
on its writable attribute, ignoring the readable attribute) pretty much
makes sense. And in fact maybe the readable attribute serves no purpose,
although it does kind of logically seem like, if you have a writable
attribute, you might as well have a readable one, too...
Marc
On Wed, 27 Nov 2002, Bill Stewart wrote:
>
No specific docs really... I'm open to suggestions as if its not
>
readable, then I would suggest it shouldn't be displayed...
>
>
The generic view tests for two flags that disqualify a parameter for
>
display...
>
>
It *has* to be writable
>
It can't be an "expert mode" parameter - as the Gen view is displaying
>
as generic and simple representation as possible (so we skip the expert
>
params) - you could imagine a tabbed view of "Simple"/"Expert" at some
>
stage if we see enough AU's with expert params
>
>
Bill
>
>
On Wednesday, November 27, 2002, at 08:46 AM, Nikolaus Gerteis wrote:
>
>
>> Beyond, at least until those apps start to take notice of the
>
>> IsReadable
>
>> and IsWritable parameter property flags in their generic plugin
>
>> GUIs...
>
>
>
> Which brings up the question for me: How is a parameter to be treated
>
> that is not readable? Is there anything about it in the documentation?
>
>
>
> Niko
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