LiveCode 8.0.0 Property Palette

[richmond62]

Ali Lloyd has informed us:

"There may not be many immediately obvious advantages to the new property inspector, but there are two extraordinarily significant related ones:

1) Widget properties would not work with the old inspector. You would perhaps have to create individual stacks for each widget and have its card
copied to the inspector. This is really not practical or viable in the long term.

The new inspector just requires a few lines of metadata in the widget file specifying what type of editor to use for a given property. Everything else
happens automatically.

2) The new inspector is *really* flexible for the classic objects. Have a look at this fix for bug 16118 (no way to change a scrollbar's tooltip in
the property inspector):
https://github.com/livecode/livecode-ide/pull/562/files"

I am not sure quite how these 2 points justify a complete remake of the appearance of the thing:

The Property Palettes from LiveCode 7.1 and 8.0 respectively.

The Property Palette Top for LiveCode 7.1
The Property Palette section Navigator is outlined in red.
The Stack/Card/Object selector is outlined in green.

The Property Palette Top for LiveCode 8.0
The Property Palette section Navigator is outlined in red.
The Stack/Card/Object selector is outlined in green.

These two property palettes are entirely different: I am unable to determine whether my preference for the older version is simply a matter
of "habit and repute" or that I find it more intuitive, or that I feel so lazy I don't really feel like bothering to learn to use the newer one.

[shaosean]

Why are the labels to the left of the check box?

[richmond62]

I suppose the idea is to bring them into line with the other labels above them.

There are a number of things that need looking at here:

1. The LiveCode 8 Property Palette has got shorter and fatter.

[I hope that doesn't send us some sort of coded message about the people in Edinburgh]

2. The check boxes are now evenly spaced down the palette, while before they were in a set of 'clumps'.

3. There is no dropDown menu but a series of buttons instead: dunno: matter of taste really.

Mind you, I don't know why RunRev seem to be changing somethings just for the sake of it.
If one considers Revolutions; those that were sudden and tried to impose vast chances on
the population were the ones that had the worse long term effects.
Those gradual revolutions had more lasting and more stable effects.

[shaosean]

Looks stupid..

[richmond62]

"Looks stupid." is not a very constructive comment, and completely unhelpful.

I started this thread not for name-calling but for users to discuss the new aspects of LiveCode 8.0.0 and, possibly, come to some sort of consensus, or at least,
let Richard Gaskin have something to "do battle" with the people at RunRev if necessary.

If you can explain why you think the new palette with the labels on the left looks 'stupid' that would be very helpful.

[richmond62]

I wonder why the Development team changed so many aspects of the Interface, apparently quite needlessly.

The multiple control alignment 'thing' is symptomatic of this tendency:

How to align multiple objects in LiveCode 7:
{via the Properties palette]

How to align multiple objects in LiveCode 8:
[via the menuBar]

[FourthWorld]

The menu option is not a replacement, but an alternative way to do alignment, and has been present for many versions.

What's missing is the Inspector pane for multiple objects.

What's the number of the bug report you filed for this?

[richmond62]

"The menu option is not a replacement, but an alternative way to do alignment, and has been present for many versions."

How right you are: and all that proves is how dependent I, for one, have been on the ALIGNMENT panel in the Properties Palette.

[FourthWorld]

What's the number of the bug report you filed for this?

[Simon]

I prefer "The Property Palette Top for LiveCode 8.0"
I was always annoyed that it always took two clicks to go from say Text Formatting to Size and Position. With the new Property Palette is easier to bounce back and forth between them.

But... Ahh shoot! I don't see a way of locking them in LC8? To compare two objects.

Simon

[livecodeali]

We haven't got round to implementing inspector locking / multiple inspectors yet - I think it should be fairly straightforward now so I will add it to my list to look at for DP 9.

http://quality.runrev.com/show_bug.cgi?id=15603

[Simon]

Good News

Simon

[bhall2001]

The Property Palette is one of the reasons I've been hesitant to move to LC8. But I'm starting the process now with a couple of my projects. Now that I've spent some time in LC8 I would like to offer my observations on the PP.

I don't like the default settings of Short/Wide. When looking at other software applications I have installed (Mac), as I suspected, the majority of palettes in UIs are Narrow/Tall. I'd sure like to see the Palette default to Narrow/Tall as it "fits" better in screen real estate and appears to be the defacto UI choice for palettes.

Personally, I'd default the UI to icons instead of text for the tabs (yes easy enough to change, but default I'd reverse the setting). I do have a suggestion with the panels (I'd almost call it a bug I think). When in icon view in the PP, the text label of the panel should be a tool tip that pops up when hovering. The Tools palette does this for everything (including widgets). Seems strange that the Property Palette does not use tool tips.

Getting the Property Palette to be Narrow/Tall is an easy thing to do (just drag the window to what you like it do be, narrow/tall in my case). BUT, another suggestion.

I prefer the minimum allowable width for the PP. There are panels that increase the width to wider than the minimum. Once the palette is resized to the new "minimum" width, that becomes the new minimum.

If it is felt that these certain panels need to be wider, it would be nice to have the PP return back to the original size/location that I set for my tastes.

I'd also suggest looking at these wider panels and see what is thought about leaving the Palette at the minimum set. Personally, I don't see an issue with the wider than min panels I've come across.

LC8 is almost Palette-able (couldn't resist at DP16. DP17 with the additions I see is probably going to be my tipping point for starting the move to LC8 for new work. Moving to picayune UI suggestions means LC8 is in the home stretch...

-Bob

[jacque]

What's the number of the bug report you filed for this?

I had the same question. It isn't a bug, it's design. When more than one control is selected, the alignment icon appears in the palette and the pane is the same as before. The problem I see is that the icon appears at the left of the icon row, which isn't where your eye expects it to be, and you don't notice it. It's existence had to be pointed out to me.

I think it should always be present, but disabled as appropriate. If it absolutely has to be dynamically existent, it should appear at the right.

[jacque]

I prefer the minimum allowable width for the PP. There are panels that increase the width to wider than the minimum.

Yes, the wider palette gets in my way too. I also think that popdown buttons should not expand to the full width of the pane just because they can. Open the property inspector for a field, for example, and you'll see very wide menu buttons for borderwidth, scrollbarwidth, and firstindent. They will never contain more than two or three characters, and their sizes should be set to a fixed width that accomodates only those numbers. It looks odd the way it is.The same thing happens in the Text pane, and in other controls throughout.

I also agree that the labels should be to the right of the checkboxes, since that is standard HIG on every OS. Look at the General pane in OS X's System Preferences and you'll see an example of how it's usually done. If the left of the checkboxes align with the left of fields and other controls, it will look okay.