Bennett Helm wrote:
On Feb 25, 2008, at 2:32 AM, Abdelrazak Younes wrote:
Bennett Helm wrote:
Perhaps the biggest UI problem on Mac concerns the recent addition of
a button on the left of the tab bar to hide a document within that
window. I don't know how it is on other platforms, but on Mac
clicking that button simply makes the document disappear without a
trace ... unless you know to look in the View menu. I'm sure many Mac
users will think that they have closed the document and, because
there is no chance to save it before it disappears, will likely panic
thinking they have lost some work.
I thought about this when I added it. I understanding it can be
confusing but this is really needed IMHO. The main reason is to
support correctly multipart document. I would like to make LyX open
automatically all child documents in the background (i.e. without
having a work area affected to them). The other reason is that I want
to arrange the tabs in each window independently. Taking this last
argument into account, the only way we can avoid the user panic
described above is to disable support of multi-view of a same document.
I'm not sure I follow you here, but let me take a shot. By "support
multi-view of the same document" you mean being able to view a single
document in more than one window
Yes.
(as opposed to a split view within the
same window.
Well, not as opposed to that. From the programming POV, two tab groups
inside a same window or in two different windows are the same. The
difference is of course that you can see immediately what documents are
still left open if it you "unsplit" the view.
On Mac, at least, that's a highly unusual feature; I've
seen it only on a few text editors aimed at programmers (such as
Smultron). With being able to split the view horizontally and then
maximize the window (to fullscreen, even), the usefulness of multi-view
as a separate feature IMO is greatly diminished and so not worth the
potential for confusion it engenders.
Depends, I personally have a lot of documents opened and I gather them
by subject per window. The same as I do with Firefox FWIW.
Concerning arranging tabs: can't this be done instead by dragging and
dropping the tabs -- both to change the order within a window and to
move a tab from one window to a different window?
Sure, every thing's possible and drag&drop would be nice. Maybe for 1.7 :-)
> That would seem to be
a much more natural UI to get what you want (at least if I understand
you correctly).
Concerning support for child documents, I'm not sure what all the issues
are. What comes to mind is the need to load child documents for the
purposes of typesetting the master and making available cross references
between documents.
Right.
For that, I agree that we should "load" child
documents in the background, without displaying them in a window unless
the user explicitly asks for them. If after having explicitly opened a
particular child document a user doesn't want to see it anymore, then
that document should simply be closed (with a prompt to save if needed)
and should appear to the user as if it is closed, even if it is still
loaded in the background for the purposes of typesetting and cross
references. (Thus, for example, it should not appear in the View menu,
it should not reappear via the sessions file when LyX is relaunched --
as currently happens --, and so on.) Hence I don't see any reason to
allow a user to explicitly make an open document invisible (but still
open).
So you are advocating to not let the user able to effectively close a
child buffer if its master is still open? I don't say this is a bad idea
but we have to think a bit more about this. Especially since a child
document can have multiple master depending on which master is current.
(An aside: with background loading of child documents, it might be nice
to have a list of child documents appear in the Document menu for the
master document, such that selecting a child would open it as a tab in
the same window as the master document. If we did this, it might also be
useful to have a menu option to open all child documents.)
Good idea yes.
It is also possible to then close all visible documents, attempt to
quit LyX, and have a hidden document (that you thought had been lost)
pop up, asking for you to save it. Such surprises shouldn't be
allowed to happen: there needs to be a visual indication of which
documents are open.
I agree this can be disturbing if you are not used to it (I am
obviously :-)) I've thought about a red light somewhere in the status
bar (or just next to the close button) that would pop up a combo for
hidden documents. Do you reckon it will be enough?
No: I think that would be bad UI design -- an attempt to mitigate
without solving the underlying problem. What is needed is a UI feature
that communicates clearly and directly to the user what it means; a red
light (even with tooltip help) doesn't do this, and I can't think of
anything that would. Hence I think the risk of confusion (and even
panic) remains quite high with this hiding feature.
I see your point but I am not so sure it is that terrible.
On Mac, hiding a document is typically done by minimizing the window
containing it to the Dock, something which is already possible. Of
course, I realize the intent of the new feature is different than
this, but I don't see any way to implement this new feature without
confusion.
Me neither. So I guess we will need some user options because I don't
want to degrade _my_ user experience :-)
Fair enough (especially since you're coding and I'm not!), but I hope a
solution is possible that would enhance the experience for all. (Do my
suggestions above do this?)
Oh your suggestions make sense, I don't deny that. But I am not sure I
want to degrade the advanced user experience because newbies are subject
to panic :-)
Anyway, I don't have much time right now so I hope others will come and
handle these issues pro-actively.
MS Word always creates a new document when you launch it maybe we
should do this also when there is no sessions file?
Yes -- that is standard behavior for almost all programs on Mac
Pavel, are you taking that item? (I am just passing the hot potato :-))
2. Closing the last window causes LyX to exit. This should not happen
on Mac.
This is related to a bugzilla entry about unique instance. How would
you exit LyX on Mac.
Only by direct user request: LyX > Quit or <Cmd>Q.
This is not too difficult to achieve but the implication are not obvious
for Windows and X11 platforms.
A related -- and even pickier -- issue is that the whole document
area seems to be set in a frame (again, see screenshot), which on Mac
at least normally is absent. (Thus, on Mac the white area for text
normally extends all the way to the edge of the window, with no
border at all.)
If you hit F11 and F11 again the frame disappears right? If yes, we
can get rid of it. Possibly for all platforms.
F11 has special meaning on Macs by default, so that can't be the right
key to use. What does F11 do on Linux/Windows?
That's the current shortcut for fullscreen mode toggling.
Is there an alternative
way to do whatever that is?
ui-toggle fullscreen :-)
Abdel.
