Topic: Making the message window smaller
GunChleoc
Topic Opener
Joined: 2013-10-07, 14:56
Posts: 3324  One Elder of Players Location: RenderedRect |
Posted at: 2015-09-02, 09:43
One problem that players are having with the in-game UI now is that I had to make the message window very wide in order to fit translations. I have been thinking about this and we could save some space by replacing the message titles with icons, and moving the message titles as a heading into the message itself. What does everybody think, good idea / bad idea / any other ideas? Bug: https://bugs.launchpad.net/widelands/+bug/1492114 Edited: 2015-09-06, 12:04
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fk
Joined: 2013-07-30, 21:58
Posts: 151  At home in WL-forums |
Posted at: 2015-09-02, 11:51
My first thought is whether the titels can be shortened (if that has not already been done).
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kaputtnik
Joined: 2013-02-18, 19:48
Posts: 2442 OS: Archlinux Version: current master One Elder of Players Location: Germany |
Posted at: 2015-09-02, 18:18
Currently the message box is separated into three sections:
In my opinion the size of the messages table is too short. There is place for 5 and a half messages. This could be more i think. Meanwhile the size of the "description section" is to big. There is no description, either an icon, that fits the size of this section in a normal game. So most space is given away in this section. In scenarios there is maybe more space needed and that's the reason why it is so big? Because of the definitions to the size of the message table, some functions aren't useful in my mind:
The section "description" is useful for beginners, but if someone played a few times he knows what the message means and what he should may do (f.e. upgrade a mine). I think this section could generally omitted and replaced with a kind of "help" button which shows the description. So everyone could open the help and retrieve additional information, just like the build help. If we need some mockups i would love to make them Fight simulator for Widelands:
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GunChleoc
Topic Opener
Joined: 2013-10-07, 14:56
Posts: 3324 One Elder of Players Location: RenderedRect |
Posted at: 2015-09-03, 07:35
Yes, the descriptions can get longer in the scenarios and for objectives in general, e.g. the list of each player's points in Collectors. Width is not a problem here though, we just need to make sure that it has enough height to still be read comfortably. I expect that height is not a problem as long as it fits into the screen, what seems to be annoying is the width of the window. Just shifting some height here to the messages table to make it longer without changing the overall height of the window shouldn't be a problem though. If we run out of horizontal space for the filter buttons during the redesign, we could fit those on the bottom where we show the type of the current message. I have never used the checkboxes to mark any messages, but then I don't get to play that much. I find it easier to just hit the archive button straight away. I think the time sent information might still be useful, what do our players think? As to the images we could use as title icons, I am thinking of using the building's icons for any message that comes from a building. For ships, we could use the anchor icon for "port space found", and for "coast reached" etc. the icon of the button that was pressed. For scenario messages, use the objectives menu icon as default and make it configurable through Lua - e.g. when we lose a building to the ocean in the Atlantean scenario, it should show an icon of that building instead. Busy indexing nil values
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kaputtnik
Joined: 2013-02-18, 19:48
Posts: 2442 OS: Archlinux Version: current master One Elder of Players Location: Germany |
Posted at: 2015-09-03, 20:55
I am unsure what you mean where you want to place the images. I guess you want to put them into the table instead of the text messages? I tried to define some terms for each section in the message box, but i feel that you define the sections in another way. We should use the same terms (either yours or my ones) to prevent misunderstanding. I didn't play some of the campaigns yet, but today i played the atlantean campaign. In this campaign i didn't found anything that needs a lot of space in the message box. But there is maybe an other campaign which needs more space. We (i) have to check this. Edit: deleted "scenario" vs. "campaign" sentence. Edited: 2015-09-03, 21:07
Fight simulator for Widelands:
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GunChleoc
Topic Opener
Joined: 2013-10-07, 14:56
Posts: 3324 One Elder of Players Location: RenderedRect |
Posted at: 2015-09-04, 06:54
An image says more than a 1000 words... screenshot with labelled elements.
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kaputtnik
Joined: 2013-02-18, 19:48
Posts: 2442 OS: Archlinux Version: current master One Elder of Players Location: Germany |
Posted at: 2015-09-04, 18:52
Great Changing the message titles into icons... hmm... i am not happy with this idea. What icon will you use for "Status" message? But i will try to make a mockup with this idea and we will see further. Placing the filter buttons on the bottom isn't useful in my mind. Thats because they act with the table and should be near by the table. If some of the buttons wanted to be moved to the bottom, the "Archive/Show Archive" buttons are the ones i choose. It's semantic logical to have this buttons on the bottom, when all information of the message ("Title" and "Description") has been read. The icon for message type (currently the only one at the bottom) is complete useless (in this position) in my mind. If the checkboxes in the "select" column where removed, this the right place for the message type label. So every message in the table has the icon of which type of message this row is, and a conclusion to the filter buttons is given. Additional the table could be sorted by "Type of message". Removing the "select" column from the table would also make the "Unmark all/Reverse" checkboxes in the button section superfluous. Maybe while creating the mockup someone of the players tell us his opinion about the "Time Sent" column. Fight simulator for Widelands:
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GunChleoc
Topic Opener
Joined: 2013-10-07, 14:56
Posts: 3324 One Elder of Players Location: RenderedRect |
Posted at: 2015-09-05, 07:36
I would use the "Objective" icon, the second one from the right on the game menu.
If we get rid of the "select" column, we would also lose the 2 buttons on top for it (as you write below), so the space problem will probably be solved anyway.
Good idea. It is basically on the bottom because we didn't know where to put it *lol
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kaputtnik
Joined: 2013-02-18, 19:48
Posts: 2442 OS: Archlinux Version: current master One Elder of Players Location: Germany |
Posted at: 2015-09-06, 11:51
So here is the first mockup... Texts for the description section are not adjusted yet, also the heights of table and description:
I changed the status icon to "genstats" icon, because the Objectives icon is already used for the type. Most icons are bigger in height than the lineheight. I leave this and let them overlap. Don't know if this is possible in a table. The icon for "Headquarters" (last half line in the table) has to be resized, and i think other images of some buildings has to be resized too if we want them in the table. I tried to figure out which messages we already have and which title they have. So here is a list of all titles which needs an appropriate icon for the table (hopefully this list is complete):
Maybe we need here some other (new) icons for the last three titles. Displaying a normal Sentry if it is lost is maybe not as good in comparison with "Military site lost!".
Edit: Ressources added Edited: 2015-09-06, 13:48
Fight simulator for Widelands:
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GunChleoc
Topic Opener
Joined: 2013-10-07, 14:56
Posts: 3324 One Elder of Players Location: RenderedRect |
Posted at: 2015-09-06, 12:03
I think it looks good - I would reverse the buttons on the bottom though, since the "Go to building" buttons are typically towards the right in the building windows. I think the table row height will automatically adjust itself to the images, so there won't be any overlap when this is implemented. Busy indexing nil values
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