Hello,
I recently re-read all the GSoC suggestions for 2010, and I found this interesting one about making the menus searchable: https://sites.google.com/site/gimpwiki/long-term-plans/menu-accesibility
As far as I know, menus are searchable and the best example is the keyboard shortcuts dialog which has a searchbox to find the GIMP action you'd like to use. So I asked on #gimp and I was told there was a discussion on IRC about finding a more usable replacement to the plugin browser.
So, to get a formal record of this discussion, I'm starting it on the mailing list again.
Here are points which should be considered:
0. How do we want the search to work? A user can bring a search dialog up? Will the search be based on a string? A tree?
1. GEGL ops should really be integrated in the GIPM menus. As someone said, it's like the old script-fu menu - it was wrong. We don't have to force the user to remember what's a GEGL op (which will be accessed using the GEGL tool) and what's a regular plugin/script.
It's a bit offtopic, but we should find a way to implement gegl plugins with a custom GUI, and register them like regular plugins in the menus. Having a search that will once point to a plugin and once activate the gegl tool, is a very bad idea...
2. We need to define a "usable" plugin browser. One of the features I'm missing the most, is a preview image. Plugins should have an option to register a preview image of their effect (probably by having the image's binary data embedded in them). This also relates to the feature request of having a logo script browser...
3. Will plugins also have a category (in addition to a menu location)? How should we organize the plugins? On one hand, it's probably a bad idea to continue having plugin authors choose their own category (or as it is now - a menu location). Since then you might find yourself with dozens of categories (like "my-site" "his-site") and typos ("artisti" and "artistic") or redefinitions ("art" vs. "artistic") may create more categories.
It's a fact - a bloated category list is good for nothing... So, should we limit the categories for plugins?
4. Another option, instead of categories and sub-categories, is tagging - like the brushes work in 2.7 (unlike categories - there are no sub-levels, and each plugin can be in many places)
Menus in GIMP should become more useful and things should become easier to find. But how? Please share your thoughts
~LightningIsMyName
I recently re-read all the GSoC suggestions for 2010, and I found this interesting one about making the menus searchable: https://sites.google.com/site/gimpwiki/long-term-plans/menu-accesibility
As far as I know, menus are searchable and the best example is the keyboard shortcuts dialog which has a searchbox to find the GIMP action you'd like to use. So I asked on #gimp and I was told there was a discussion on IRC about finding a more usable replacement to the plugin browser.
So, to get a formal record of this discussion, I'm starting it on the mailing list again.
Here are points which should be considered:
0. How do we want the search to work? A user can bring a search dialog up? Will the search be based on a string? A tree?
1. GEGL ops should really be integrated in the GIPM menus. As someone said, it's like the old script-fu menu - it was wrong. We don't have to force the user to remember what's a GEGL op (which will be accessed using the GEGL tool) and what's a regular plugin/script.
It's a bit offtopic, but we should find a way to implement gegl plugins with a custom GUI, and register them like regular plugins in the menus. Having a search that will once point to a plugin and once activate the gegl tool, is a very bad idea...
2. We need to define a "usable" plugin browser. One of the features I'm missing the most, is a preview image. Plugins should have an option to register a preview image of their effect (probably by having the image's binary data embedded in them). This also relates to the feature request of having a logo script browser...
3. Will plugins also have a category (in addition to a menu location)? How should we organize the plugins? On one hand, it's probably a bad idea to continue having plugin authors choose their own category (or as it is now - a menu location). Since then you might find yourself with dozens of categories (like "my-site" "his-site") and typos ("artisti" and "artistic") or redefinitions ("art" vs. "artistic") may create more categories.
It's a fact - a bloated category list is good for nothing... So, should we limit the categories for plugins?
4. Another option, instead of categories and sub-categories, is tagging - like the brushes work in 2.7 (unlike categories - there are no sub-levels, and each plugin can be in many places)
Menus in GIMP should become more useful and things should become easier to find. But how? Please share your thoughts
~LightningIsMyName
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