GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 120424
there should be better defaults
Last modified: 2004-12-22 21:47:04 UTC
Here is a list of default settings that I think should be changed. I'm sure there's more. * The transformation tools have "None (Fastest)" as the default. I suggest Linear * The Window title/statusbar is "%f-%p.%i (%t)" and "%f-%p.%i (%t)" resp. It could be something like "%f-%p.%i (%t) : %z%%" and "%w x %h px (%W%u x %H%u) : %l layers : %z%% : %m" resp * open recent could list more entries, since it's a 2nd level menu now.
Title could be "%D*%f[%L]-%p.%i (%t) %z%%", showing active layer and "dirtiness". Status bar could use less spaces too and not repeat zoom.
The default for the transform tools interpolation setting is a bug. It should default to what's set in the prefs and that's Linear by default. The code looks fine but for some strange reason, None seems to be used.
The bug part if this report is fixed in CVS: 2003-08-26 Michael Natterer <mitch@gimp.org> * app/tools/gimptransformoptions.c (gimp_transform_options_class_init): it's GIMP_INTERPOLATION_LINEAR, not just GIMP_LINEAR, argh. Fixes part 1 of bug #120424. The rest is an enhancment request.
* zoom ratio : in each image's title, it would be better to put the zoom ratio For example, for a new image whose name is foo, the title is: foo (100%), than if I zoom in the title is foo (200%) * cancelation it's possible to cancel the last 5 operations, i think 5 is not enough, would be nice to have at least 10
Please note that the semantics of undo-levels has changed in 1.3. It is now the minimum number of undo levels. As described in the manpage: More undo levels are kept available until the undo-size limit is reached. So it is probably reasonable to keep the default for undo-levels at 5. We could however discuss to increase the default for undo-size which is currently set to 1024K.
2003-09-23 Sven Neumann <sven@gimp.org> * app/config/gimpguiconfig.c: increased the default last-opened-size from 4 to 10; increased the max-new-image-size from 32M to 64M.
I think we should consider changing the default image title/image statusbar formats as Jimmac suggests at the beginning of this bug report. I suggest we use Jimmacs suggestion with the following modifications: Image Title (indicate dirtyness as suggested by gsromero): %D*%f-%p.%i (%t) : %z%% Image Statusbar (more compact format, don't show zoom percentage here): %wx%hpx (%Wx%H%u) : %l layers : %m
Should we enable perfect-mouse by default?
I have never been able to tell the practical difference between (perfect-mouse yes) and (perfect-mouse no) on my system... I'll leave that up to you.
gsromero was kind enough to teach/show me the difference between the two modes - having seen this I definately think we should provide (perfect-mouse yes) as the default setting.
I also think pefect cursor should be the default since it was largely the reason why I thought bug #119423 sucked so bad. If I had it on, I may have not thought of the lack of redraw as such a drawback.
I see that Sven has changed the default title/status bar format in app/config/gimpdisplayconfig.c version 1.22 - but not to what was suggested in this bug report?
Well, there were multiple suggestions here, most of them IMO go too far and lead to visual clutter. I tried to find a good compromise. Nothing is final yet though.
I like the new defaults except for one thing: the missing 'dirty' indicator.
IMHO the dirty indicator is not useful enough to be in the defaults. The star isn't intuitive and irritates new users. It clutters the image title and gives not much extra value. GIMP warns you anway if you attempt to close an image that has been modified. Just my opinion though...
But since 1.2.x users expects the star to be there I consider it a regression if it isn't there by default. A compromise would be to add the title from the 1.2.x series (%D*%f-%p.%i (%t) %z%%) to format_strings[] in app/gui/preferences-dialog.c under the name "Classic".
I don't think your suggesting is helpful. "Classic" is as arbitrarily as "Misc" or "Foobar". If enough people disagree with me, then we should probably add the dirty indicator back.
I would also like to have the dirty indicator back, please. It is very useful to have it as the first character of the title, especially when you have several dozen images iconified/minimized and you want to be able to check (qucikly) which ones need saving. Having the width and height in the title would also be useful. In fact, I think that the status bar should be reserved for transient messages (such as the size of the current selection, and so on) or for help messages such as those used in the path tool. The help messages should be expanded and used in all tools, so that would replace the "default" message for the status bar (i.e., the current indications would not be used anymore). I know that this is a bit different from what was suggested in this bug, but I think that it would make the GIMP easier to use. Should I open a separate bug report for that, or is it close enough that we can discuss it here?
Raphael, what you suggest is completely off-topic and can certainly not go into a bug report with milestone 2.0. Please ignore your personal preferences here and think about what the casual user and newbies will find useful. I doubt the dirty indicator in the image title counts as such a thing.
Well, I think the * was nice. In the past I remember it was a common practice in lots of apps, so you could save the ones unsaved or discard them, and finally close the rest in one go. I guess that for the sake of simplicity and less clutter it is prefered that now you have to slowly go one by one if you want to be sure.
Sven, please do not be so agressive in your reply. While the second part of my comment would be more appropriate for a separate bug report (and I suggested exactly that), the first part is not really about personal preferences. This is a real problem that I have observed when working with a large number of images. With the dirty indicator (default in gimp-1.2), it is easy to see which ones need saving. Without it, it is necessary to check each image separately. It is simply more convenient and it does not cost much in terms of space (one character). I haven't seen any users complaining about its presence.
I also like the dirty indicator. Btw, Apple the prince of "doing it our way and screw your preferences" and duke of "minimalistic, intuitive interfaces" thought the "dirty" indicator was important enough to include it in the gui for the close box of every window.
I am not concerned about the space it takes up. I am concerned about the fact that the user doesn't have much chance of understanding what the star is trying to tell her.
what about, instead of a star, we put (changed) or some such?
I have seen other programs adding " (modified)" or " (edited)" at the end of the title. This is easier to understand but less convenient than a single star because it takes more space and because it is displayed at the end instead of the beginning so it may not be displayed by some WMs if the title (or icon name) is too long. As I wrote above, I haven't seen reports of users complaining about the star or asking what it was about, so maybe it is not that hard for novices to figure out why it is there?
Have both a long form ("(modified)" is what gedit uses, so lets be consistent) and a short form ("*") for the format string. And default to the long form, and perhaps put a "Compact" preset in prefs for the old style.
Yeah, having current %Dx and some other for long (and I guess i18n) version would be the wisest compromise.
Created attachment 23029 [details] [review] Patch to add a long dirty flag to title bar. Doesn't change the defaults.
A "long dirty flag indicator" would be a nice addition. The patch looks good to me. I still think we per default should have the title bar indicate the dirty status somehow - but it's not something I wish to keep pushing to get.
I thought this was possible already using the %D format string. Doesn't "%D(modified)" work? If not, perhaps it should do.
You are right, Sven: the %D format was added precisely for doing that. See bug #5843 for details. This means that translators would have to translate the whole format string. This is the right solution, IMHO.
Judging from the code in app/display/gimpdisplayshell-title.c lines 244-254 %D only works with the following char.
Partly fixed in CVS HEAD - bumping the patch from bolsh to milestone 2.2. 2004-01-08 Henrik Brix Andersen <brix@gimp.org> * app/config/gimpdisplayconfig.c: added %D* to DEFAULT_IMAGE_TITLE_FORMAT. Fixes part of bug #120424 - the patch for including a long dirty indicator (%B) should be applied for gimp-2.2.
I take back what I wrote above: after thinking a bit more about it, I am not sure that %D would be the right solution in this case. It would require the format string to be translated by the GIMP and stored in the user's gimprc. Although this would be fine for strings defined by the user, this is not a good idea for those that are part of the default settings because this means that if the user starts the GIMP for the first time in the C locale and then switches to another one (or vice-versa), then the whole interface would be translated except for the message in the title bar because the incorrect translation would already be in the gimprc. So I think that Dave's solution would be OK as a special case. It could be documented as: %B is a shortcut for %D[(modified)] except that the "(modified)" message is automatically translated.
I'd like to see an enhancement request for a long %D format string and this bug being closed. Would that be doable?
The enhancement request for a long dirty indicator is tracked in bug #130943. Closing this bug as FIXED.