Asger Alstrup Nielsen writes:
> However, I fear that it starts out a move in a dangerous direction
> towards more WYSIWYG use, that would undermine the primary benefit
> of LyX as it is. Let me explain what I mean:
>
> I don't agree that it would be a benefit to put the margin notes in
> the margin of the screen... It will only confuse navigation (try to
> work with several columns in Word, and you will see what I mean),
> and the WYSIWYG aspect of it will always be an emulation. We will
> never break the lines at the appropriate spots anyway, and thus the
> benefit is not there, as I see it. Yes, it would show how cool you
> are as coders, but on a usability scale, I fear it would make things
> worse.
Just for those who weren't around for the prior incarnations of this
debate:
As Larry Marso pointed out, there have been [and continue to be]
requests for showing page numbers/page breaks, text flow around
figures, and similar in LyX. In short, the requests are for more
WYSIWYG. We then spend some time discussing and/or debating why these
requests are impractical if not outright impossible to implement. We
explain that WYSIWYM==>visual *cues*, not necessarily exact
reproduction. It's just one of those things that cyclically flares
up, so we tend to be a tad sensitive about it.
I do have a couple of ideas for improvements to the current margin
note stuff, specifically, better visual cues. I'll cover those below.
> My proposal is therefor that this cool behaviour should be optional: Either
> you can make the ERT auto-collapse, or manually collapsed. The trade-off is
> between cool-ness and usability.
>
> > What do you think?
Guess what I'm going to suggest?
That's right: make auto-or-manual collapsability be a "Style" option
in the *.layout files. Indeed, I think the ability to place a
paragraph in a collapsable inset should be a *.layout file option.
[As if anyone didn't know that. ;) ]
Now, on to Margin Notes: I have a few ideas I'd like to toss out
there.
First: Let me say that the superscripted box with the word "foot" or
"margin" is a wonderful implementation that we should all be proud
of. I think we've done a fine job with collapsable inset boxes. That
stays the same for all of my suggestions.
Second: Each change I suggest requires primarily cosmetic visual
changes. We want to distinguish a Margin Note from other collapsable
insets.
Here are some ideas.
#1: Point To Margin/Point To Inset.
Replace the "!" on the left margin with a more visible arrow: "->"
pointing at the line containing the margin note inset.
To the left edge of the superscripted "margin" box, add an arrow: "<-"
pointing to the left margin.
#2: More Visible Than a Blinking "!"
Replace the nearly invisible "!" on the left margin with a painted
rectangle. The size, orientation, and color of the rectangle is
flexible: we'd use whatever looked best visually. The box would not
be taller than the space between two baselines, would be centered on
the line, and would not be wider than 2em. Other than that, it's open
what these would look like.
#3: Margin Button
I think this may have been what Alejandro had in mind. Replace the
"!" on the left margin with something that looks like a button. Yes,
the superscripted "margin" box would still be where we've always put
it; didn' I say that already? :) The button on the left margin,
however, would be clickable and would *also* open the margin note
inset. "*also*" here == in addition to the usual behavior.
=======
On a similar vein, we might want to replace the superscripted box with
"table" and "fig" with something more visible and distinguishing. It
could be a button, as tall as an upcase character and as wide as need
be, showing a table-like or figure-like icon. If you don't like
just the icon, we could still have the words "table" or "fig"
someplace on the button/box. This would do two things: Make
table/figure floats more visible, and distinguish them from
foot/margin notes.
Discuss.
--
John Weiss
