Beta release 3.1b

[Kjell]

Hej Ville,

All while the preview window (Bitmap component editor) is displayed.

Exactly, all while the preview is displayed* .. not the ( component ) editor That's exactly why i used a clear distinction between the two concepts in the tiles & sprites documentation.

*I'm aware that the Bitmap & Mesh preview viewports are technically part of the component editor right now.



Of course you want & should be able to see a preview of your Bitmap / Mesh while you're working on it. Either using the component specific preview, or a locked Model, or your App. Which is exactly what you can't do with the Sound and SpriteSheet components right now.

K

[jph_wacheski]

Hi Guys, I am not working with the latest beta currently,. so maybe I'm missing something.

In general, I do not like the idea of a bunch of windows manipulations to get stuff done. As a single monitor user, I find apps that throw windows all over unwieldy to work with, and would much prefer ZGE stick with organized panels.

I think we can select everything to edit from the tree, and only the single value slider ever appears in that bottom panel, could it just be moved?

Tabbed editors would be a much better solution than detachable windows,. look at Blender with its no overtop-ness design paradigm.

[VilleK]

Hi Jph,

As a single monitor user, I find apps that throw windows all over unwieldy to work with, and would much prefer ZGE stick with organized panels.

You don't need to open windows, you can work just like before. However if you find a need to edit multiple components simultaneously, or while running the game, you can do that now with the "detach window" feature. So this doesn't remove anything from before it is just an addition for advanced editing.

I'm not a big fan of multiple windows either. However they have their uses. If I want to work on multiple code editors or Excel-documents (yes, I need to use Excel sometimes) I want to have them visible at the same time side-by-side.

Kjell, I see what you mean with the preview window. But don't you think it would be occasions where you want to use the preview window to run your game and see a preview of a bitmap at the same time? I say let's try this version for a while and consider what can be done. I haven't yet seen a suggestion for the UI that convinces me it is the best for all kinds of use. I encourage anyone to make a specification (in a similar fashion that Kjell did with his Sprite/Tile spec) for a improved UI layout so we can consider/vote for it.

[jph_wacheski]

Ah,. I missed that part, so yeah, that should work well. options are always welcome indeed.

I will try the newest beta eventually,. last release does so much already, I get lost in all the possibilities.

[Kjell]

Hej Ville,

But don't you think it would be occasions where you want to use the preview window to run your game and see a preview of a bitmap at the same time?

No. I only need to see what i'm doing once ( personally ).

I haven't yet seen a suggestion for the UI that convinces me it is the best for all kinds of use.

Awww

K

[VilleK]

Awww

I haven't forgotten those suggestions, they are good. We should definitely have a welcome dialog for instance. The "contextual button-list" is a bit of a problem because there is no standard Windows-control I can directly use. And when it is non-standard it can be bad because 1. it is harder to implement and 2. it can be non-intuitive for new users when in doesn't follow general Windows UI guidelines. However if we can now use custom controls scripted in ZGE itself, we can do pretty much anything of course. Anyway Kjell have one suggestion, I welcome more of them.

[Kjell]

Hej Ville,

The "contextual button-list" is a bit of a problem because there is no standard Windows-control I can directly use. And when it is non-standard it can be bad because 1. it is harder to implement and 2. it can be non-intuitive for new users when in doesn't follow general Windows UI guidelines.

It's simply a list of buttons though ( organized in GroupBox controls ). Which i'm sure most people are familiar with / isn't terribly intimidating ..



Technically i suspect it's not all that different to how the Property Panel is populated. But the biggest amount of work is probably defining which components can be added to what components.

K

[Imerion]

Soo excited about all new features and development happening here!

Detaching windows is an interesting and useful addition. I too prefer having everything in one window, but I can still think this will be useful now and then. As late as yesterday I found myself having to go back and forth between several components to check what values I had set on them, and this would have sped up that work considerably. If it would be possible to arrange them in tabs, perhaps selectable at the top of the Properties panel, but only displayed if there are more than one tab, would be perfect.

Since I use the code editor a lot, and have a widescreen monitor, any changes that will increase the available size for that are wellcome. I rarely need to look at the log window for example, so that could be opened only when needed. Though that doesn't save any vertical space.

Also, those groupings in Kjells examples looks nice. Unless to complicated to add, that would probably help a bit with workflow, especially for new users.

[rrTea]

VilleK: Thanks for implementing the new particles property (shrink / grow)! Very useful for both explosion and smoke

(I don't see myself using Detached windows but maybe others will find it useful...)

[Rado1]

The detached windows for mesh and bitmap throw access violation exception each time I add a new graph node (in the Graph pane). After that the graph is not displayed properly, all nodes are in the upper left corner and also the Project tree does not contain the added nodes in the Producers section. After closing the detached editor and performing some changes in producers, everything returns to normal.

BTW detached windows are not practically so bad as someone would expect, but having tabs would be much better. Ville do you plan tabbed editor (and maybe also dockable panels) in near future?

[VilleK]

Rado1: I fixed the access violation. Also moved Content back to bottom and Model.Definitions back to top. Beta updated.

The important improvement with detached editors is not so much that they are detached but instead that you can have multiple editors at the same time . So we can use tabs or something else. Personally I think detached windows have merit though because you can compare contents side by side and you can have them opened at the same time as previewing the application. If you have tabs and have to switch between them then you might as well just click between nodes in the project tree with a single component editor like before. Or am I missing something? I can see the use for tabs with code editing though.

[Imerion]

I think the benefit of having tabs for component properties would be if you have a large project, where it would take a while scrolling back and forth finding the correct ones. But I agree, for those occasions I might as well use detached windows.
Tabs for code editor sounds very nice though! I would use that.

[rrTea]

Once the "Sound" component's editor is detached, it stops reacting to the "piano" part of the keyboard, so pressing ASDFGHJ etc doesn't play anything anymore.

Edit: also it seems it does not save the changes once the detached editor is closed?

[VilleK]

Hi, this is fixed now. Download beta again if you need it.

[rrTea]

Hi! Thanks, it works