[Sugar-devel] [Design] Proposal on some Help toolbar design details

[Gary C Martin]

Hi folks,

On 4 Jul 2012, at 21:48, Gary C Martin <gary at garycmartin.com> wrote:

> Hi folks,
> 
> I just wanted to try and formally clarify some design details regarding the activity Help toolbar. The actual Help content UI varies quite a bit from activity to activity depending on the activity needs and how the developer wants to tackle it (drop down palette of text and icons, pop-up animation, adding additional help text to the main canvas area), but we should at least try to stick with one Help icon design, and put it in a place in the toolbar that keeps with the 'new' toolbar design goals.
> 
> Proposal: An activity Help toolbar icon, if present, should be placed as the last icon in the toolbar before the Stop icon, but should be left aligned with the existing custom activity icons, not right aligned next to the Stop button. A standard Help icon (already agreed previously on mail-list) should also be added to sugar-artwork for future Sugar releases for easy activity developer use, see ticket for proposed svg [1].
> 
> Activity [Edit] [View] [Custom1, Custom2 .. CustomN] [Help] _______________ Stop
> 
> Rational: The Stop icon is the most important activity primary toolbar mechanism and should, where possible, be on its own to the far right of the toolbar, for clear obvious access. Placing other buttons next to it makes Stop less visible and increasses the chance of pressing Stop accidentaly when aiming for a nearby button. Known affected activities are Implode [2], Finance [3], TurtleArt [4] (already fixed as of TurtleArt-148), Chart.

To follow up on this previous thread, several activities are now following this help proposal. I've put a simple HIG page together to cover the design for Activity authors [1]. If there are no objections I'll place it somewhere more formal (perhaps as a first step in updating the old HIG with all the design changes that have landed in Sugar in the last few years).

Regards,
--Gary

[1] http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/User:Garycmartin/Activity_Toolbar_Help#Design_details_regarding_activity_Help_toolbar

> 
> Regards,
> --Gary
> 
> [1] http://bugs.sugarlabs.org/ticket/3746
> [2] http://bugs.sugarlabs.org/ticket/3721
> [3] http://bugs.sugarlabs.org/ticket/3720
> [4] http://bugs.sugarlabs.org/ticket/3718
>