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Touchscreen MenuBar/ToolBar (was Re: GIMP UI quality opinion)

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Touchscreen MenuBar/ToolBar (was Re: GIMP UI quality opinion) Christopher Curtis 16 Feb 17:37
Christopher Curtis
2012-02-16 17:37:50 UTC (about 13 years ago)

Touchscreen MenuBar/ToolBar (was Re: GIMP UI quality opinion)

On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 11:57 AM, Aleksey Midenkov wrote:

Consider the cases when user doesn't want to use keyboard. [...] Or have no keyboard [... and uses a] touchscreen.

Whoddathunk something useful might have come out of this thread?

Let's assume for a moment that Widescreen Touchscreens are useful enough for 'professional' work in the field. Do we think the UI could be improved by combining the toolbox and menu bar into a single control, which is vertically maximal and runs along the length of one side of the image? Here's the general (ASCII-art) idea:

+---------+--------------------+ | | [2] |
| +--------------------+
| [1] | |
| | [3] |
| | |
+---------+--------------------+

[1] = Toolbar / Menubar Combo [2] = Tabbed Area
[3] = Image Area

This should look fairly familiar, but the idea is to change area [1] into something resembling the following:

+=================+ | Tool Box |
+=================+
| [a] [b] [c] [d] |
| [e] [f] [g] [h] |
| [i] [j] [k] [l] |
|-----------------|
| [fg/bg] [brush] |
|-----------------|
| [Tool Options] |
| [More Options] |
| [More Options] |
+=================+
| File |
+=================+
| Edit |
+=================+
| Select |
+=================+
| Window |
+=================+
| Filters |
+=================+

Then, tapping one of the other major labels adjusts the display thusly:

+-----------------+ | Tool Box |
+=================+
| File |
+=================+
| New -> |
|-----------------|
| Open |
|-----------------|
| Save |
|-----------------|
| Export -> |
|-----------------|
| Print |
|-----------------|
| Quit |
+=================+
| Edit |
+=================+
| Select |
+=================+
| Window |
+=================+
| Filters |
+=================+

The expandable items ("Export ->") could just open out to the side of the control, or replace it entirely (like the KDE "K" menu does, which I don't really like) or something more clever.

I think this could be considered similar to how the launcher in Ubuntu's 'Unity' interface works, but I haven't used that to say how useful it is.

There's certainly details that need to be worked out, but this seems like it could be both touchscreen and mouse-friendly.

$0.02, Chris