OCPN 3.3 Options pages Layout

[Hakan]

Originally Posted by bdbcat

Ahoy testers...
..........But it is a start, and I invite feedback.
Dave

The new "Display options" Tab among "Charts" is good but I agree with Pavel to keep the "Course up mode" on the first Tab or maybe a mirrored copy also there and keep the update frequency among Charts. There are some people I know who's searching for the Course up as the very first option to change.
For me it's a odd behaviour but we're all different and car navigators often use "Course up" so they my be used to it there.
Håkan

[rgleason]

• Caesar I understand your focus is on Units, which would help a lot.

Obviously some of the Boat parameters would overlap/coordinate/link with other settings and it needs to be clear to the user.

Since we are trying to simplify the UI, why not do this (as suggested earlier)?

User Interface
---------------------
Current choices

• Show Status Bar
• Show Menu Bar
• Show Compass/Gps Window
• Show Toolbar in Full Screen Mode

Proposed

• Show Status Bar
• Show Toolbar (maybe a radio button with Menu Bar so it is one or the other)
  
• Show Menu Bar (maybe a radio button with Menu Bar so it is one or the other)
  
• Show Compass/Gps Window

Show Toolbar in Full Screen Mode


Note: When in Windows or Linux (correct?) with "Show Toolbar" selected the "Alt" will "Show Menu Bar" until the next selection.

Toolbar needs a new "Shrink/Expand" icon next to the right hand "Grab/move/Horizontal-Vertical" for Tablet users short on screen space.

Toolbar could also possibly use a new "Command keyboard" icon for command shortcuts when there is no keyboard (Tablets).

[rgleason]

Dave, some thoughts on your proposal..
------------
Options > Display Tab
Control Options (Sub category)

• Enable Touchscreen/Tablet Interface (activates the "touch" feature)
• Enable Responsive Graphics Interface ( What does this do?)

Are these selections related to the UI selections? Maybe.

Is there any overlap? Maybe.
Should they move to the UI Tab?


---------

Options > Display Tab

Display (Sub category)

• Show Grid
• Show Depth Units
• Show Chart Outlines

Why not move these to your new Options > Charts > Display Tab
Don't they apply to the Chart display?
----------
Options > User Interface Tab
Menu Interface" or "Command Interface" instead of Miscellaneous?
- Show Status Bar
- Show Toolbar (radio button with Menu Bar so it is one or the other?)
- Show Menu Bar (radio button with Toolbar so it is one or the other?)
- Show Compass/Gps Window
- Touchscreen interface (move from display tab)
- Responsive Interface (move from display tab)

Units
-Lat/Long
-Distance
-Speed
-Magnetic Var (assumed when no Wmm?)
Also Caesar had some ideas/program for this.

Other Actions
- Show Magnetic Bearings and Headings
- Lock Waypoints
- Confirm deletion of tracks and waypoints.
- Play ships bells

----
Display Tab then has
"Course Up" and "Show Magnetic"
"Control Options"
" Opengl"

I am now having some thoughts about the similarity of the words
"Control Options" and "Menu Interface" with respect to User Interface Tab...


Anyway you wanted feedback and I think it is best to look at the outline very carefully.

[rgleason]

Dave, I undetstand that you wamt to simplify the Display page and options for new users. After thinking about this a liitle more it seems to me that splitting out some display items associated with charts that are used less will be more confusing than organizing the main Display tab better
Advanced display options could be below a horizontal line or open with an afvanced button.
This way Display options would not be in two places which in itself is not as straightforward I think...


Sent from my SCH-I545 using Cruisers Sailing Forum mobile app

[bdbcat]

Rick...

The problem child is the new "chart zoom/scale sensitivity" slider. It is an advanced concept, and I don't want that on the main Display page. But it has to go somewhere....

Same thing could be said for "Disable full screen quilting". Very rarely used option, and when it is used, it is not toggled within one session. It is a persistent setting.

Dave



Dave

[rgleason]

"Enable Transparent Toolbar"
Could the selection become integrated and automatic (when Opengl is not being used) to simplify the menus?
or do people leave this unchecked for some reason?
Does it cause any problem with tablets and touchscreens?

[rgleason]

Alternative for:
Options > Charts > Display Options
Options > Charts > Chart Control (Avoids the semantic problem)
or "Advanced Chart Control" could at the bottom of Options > Display

- Look ahead mode
- Show skewed Raster Charts as north up.
- Disable full screen quilting
- Over zoomed fuzziness control [Slider] (Landmass fuzzier edges = >#)
- others that are "advanced"

--
Mollymawk suggested
CM93 Detail Level slider and the Chart Zoom Detail Level slider on the same page, since they perform a similar function, short description beneath.
---
Pavel wanted "Course Up" and "Show Magnetic" under Options > Display

---
I think the structure of the Options is strong enough so that you can put this under "Display" or "Charts" with the semantic change as Caesar suggested.
---
Don't know how the rest of it would finish out but looking forward to seeing what you and Caesar come up with.

[petter5]

Regarding all settings that is "one time settings" like boats info in ais settings, unit settings, depth settings, connection port settings etc should be kept separate in a password protected settings page. Reason for this is that if you screw up this things accidentally, your navigation system might behave an unintended way or stop working at all. Today, these settings is easy to access from the same settings page as settings you use day to day when using the system. By separating them and protecting with a password, there will be a clear understanding and an intended action when you want to change this setting. It is this way on wheelmarked systems and it should be easy to get OpenCpn to behave the same way. Reason for doing so is safe navigation, and that should also be top priority in OpenCpn.

[bdbcat]

Rick:

Re:
Mollymawk suggested
CM93 Detail Level slider and the Chart Zoom Detail Level slider on the same page, since they perform a similar function, short description beneath.

These two options are not the same thing at all.
1. They do completely different things. One controls cm93 exclusively, the other is a global setting for all chart type zooming..
2. Many people do not use cm93, for various reasons. cm93 options should be isolated with other vector chart controls.

We could do with a rollover "tooltip" type of help description for these two sliders. I'll try to come up with the right words....


Dave

-

[rgleason]

Petter5
I understand what you are saying, but do we really want a password? .. Isn't there some other way of keeping the "one time" startup options separate that would still allow access when needed?

How much trouble is separating out all these "one time" options going to be?

[Mollymawk]

In my opinion there are a couple of confusing issues at the moment:

• There is a confusion between "Display", "Charts > Display", and "User Interface"
• The tabs on the "Charts" pane are mixed up - Chart Groups should be beside "Loaded Charts" (which might be better called "Chart Sources" of "Chart Folders"), and "Vector Charts [Display Options]" should be beside "Display Options".

I think the following organisation would be clearer.
There should be (on the top bar) two panes:

• Chart Display (current Display pane)
  This should have all options relating to how charts are displayed, with the following tabs:
  • General
    with most of the current settings from the Display tab
  • Vector Charts
    the same as the current Charts > Vecotr Charts tab
  • Advanced
    mostly the current (new) Charts > Display Options tab
  
  
  
• Chart Files (or something like this) (current Charts pane)
  This should have the following tabs:
  • Chart Directories (current Loaded Charts tab)
  • Chart Groups
  • Tides & Currents

What does anyone think?

I would be happy to make these changes so people can see what I mean and play with it, if Dave thinks it's a good idea.

Caesar

[petter5]

Originally Posted by rgleason

Petter5
I understand what you are saying, but do we really want a password? .. Isn't there some other way of keeping the "one time" startup options separate that would still allow access when needed?

How much trouble is separating out all these "one time" options going to be?

For OpenCpn geeks, there is no need to separate, they will know what they are doing. But for most folks and no geeks accidentally touching the wrong setting while under ways might render the system useless. Maybe a popup warning window where you have to press "ok understood" before entering this section of setup will be a better solution.

[Mollymawk]

Dave, of course they don't do the exact same thing, I didn't mean to imply that.
But they are related: they do the same thing but for different types of charts.

I don't necessarily think they should be on the same page - with my options grouping described above I would keep the CM93 one on the vector page and the non-CM93 one would go under Advanced.

[bdbcat]

Caesar...

I agree that the current github options implementation is a bit "muddy". I'm not satisfied with it.

Your proposal sounds interesting.

If you have the time, build it locally and give us some screen shots to consider, please.

Thanks
Dave

[HappySeagull]

Originally Posted by rgleason

"Enable Transparent Toolbar"
Could the selection become integrated and automatic (when Opengl is not being used) to simplify the menus?
or do people leave this unchecked for some reason?
Does it cause any problem with tablets and touchscreens?

I never use "transparent toolbar". It is always unchecked.

Overall,
If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I change annoyances around in my life where possible, but O's configuration tabs are among least annoying I can recall. I disagree with Mollymawk per post 26

Overall per an annoying example, is going from XP to Win7. The same features are there, but moved from one mineshaft to another mineshaft for no good reason that I can discern. I don't see why O would want to go there.
As to hiding features away in different places, it is silly to think I won't crawl into a maze to find them. The trouble comes when I forget where they are to change them back. I expect there are several others that don't want to be lost in a program they've been using for years.

I like options.Keep them all. I would rather have a long list than have to click yet another"Advanced" button .
Make a judgement call as to "most-used" and place these at the top if you can... perhaps "so-called" Advanced features could just have a separator line and a title: "Advanced" or OpenGL towards the bottom of the list.

The Vector Charts tab is probably the most dangerous one in O. You can make important stuff disappear. And yet, I recall the only fuddlement that commonly shows here on the forum has been the Text Button on the toolbar...

Maybe a popup warning window where you have to press "ok understood" before entering this section of setup will be a better solution.

When I throw a piece of wood on the fire I do not want "Are you sure you want to burn this wood?" showing up on my google-glasses or whatever. I soon learn to brush them aside as "annoyances", or more like, crush the annoyance underfoot.