[Sugar-devel] [DESIGN] Global create-new/modify icon

[Gary Martin]

Hi Simon,

On 16 Mar 2011, at 21:05, Simon Schampijer wrote:

> On 03/14/2011 11:28 AM, Gary Martin wrote:
>> Hi Simon,
>> 
>> On 10 Mar 2011, at 17:16, Simon Schampijer wrote:
>> 
>>> One of the major functionality in activities is creating and/or modifying, for example creating a new game in Memorize a new abacus in the Abacus activity and so on.
>>> 
>>> I am wondering what would be a good icon to use for that. I have seen the use of a scissor (like editing an activity), or the gear like we use in 'view source'.
>>> 
>>> Any other ideas? And then it would be great if we could set on one and be consistent in activities and use the same icon in all of them.
>> 
>> Thanks for raising this, I've added this topic to next weeks Design Team meeting, I'll try and get a few mockups together before then:
>> 
>> 	http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/Design_Team/Meetings
> 
> Great - thanks! /me loves the progress we have in design meetings over the last weeks - all thumbs up!

For every one item we get through, the agenda seems to quietly grow by two or three new ones ;-)

>> Some misc. thoughts regarding using the existing scissor/edit tool and secondary palette.
>> 
>> Pros:
>> 
>>  * existing Activity edit secondary toolbars usually have only copy, paste, sometimes also undo&  redo (so there is usually plenty of UI space)
>>  * no need to add yet another primary toolbar widget (less complex primary UI and/or space for other tools)
>>  * Sugar design model, editing is what you do during an activity to change it, 'creating new' activities should be done before an Activity begins (e.g. home -->  start new, and/or proposed Journal duplicate feature). BTW, Think it is OK for an Activity to support clearing/erasing/reseting state (such as Paint, Memorize), though ideally with reliable undo or versioning support to help prevent accidental data loss.
> 
> All valid points.
> 
>> Cons:
>> 
>>  * overloading an existing UI category (traditional OS users have certain expectations for an edit menu)?
>>  * will folks overlook the edit sub-palette and miss the extra modification features?
> 
> I fear mostly that - that people will not find that option for several reasons :/ But you are right in that using another icon has issues space wise. Let's see maybe there are other options we have not thought about yet...:)

As consensus seems to be for not overloading the scissors/edit icon, I've added an extra Memorize mockup using the cog/gear icon as a stand in container for the create/modify features/view:

  http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/User:Garycmartin#Example_using_cog_icon_for_game_customisation_features

Not sure if you caught Sunday's meeting log, but we don't have a single choice for this visual yet. The issue with the cog/gear is that we already use it for view source (and hopefully edit source at some point). As we seem to like the cog/gear in this role we might want to find something better for view-source, or perhaps use the cog/gear as a badge on something else.

BTW: I'm still a little concerned with the full canvas view change & secondary toolbar interaction (e.g. hovering over icon will switch canvas to edit view, escaping edit mode may then be non-obvious as moving cursor to canvas area should no longer hide the secondary toolbar and edit view). The only way to avoid this interaction issue seems to be for the canvas view change to be triggered by a toggle button, or a radio button pair (play vs. modify).

Regards,
--Gary

> Regards,
>   Simon