I agree with MF. I think the UI is inconsistent, but with some work
it could be modified. I think that "explorer" should look something
like Windows XP glitzed up ui, however may i suggest taking parts
from firefox or something to create Javascript type collapsable
panels like that of XP's explorer. Of course this could be turned
off. I think that another feature could be incorporated into
something like this... XML-based right-pane context menus. The
context menus would be based off of XML files either embedded within
explorer or in a subfolder in C:\reactos. These XML files would
contain macros for quick tasks. Example:
<ContextMenu>
<Action trigger="click">
<Command execute="Explorer.Copy.FolderOrFile.getCurrentFile">
Of course there would be many commands and contexts, but this would
allow users to define XML style macros. Call it something like
AppleScript
On Oct 6, 2005, at 1:50 PM, Aleksey Bragin wrote:
Hi, our UI Team Coordinator - mf - asked me to sent
this email on
his behalf, because unfortunately mails from his address doesn't
reach any mailing-list.
Here is the original message:
From: mf <mf(a)mufunyo.net>
Date: October 6, 2005 1:20:56 AM GMT+04:00
Subject: ReactOS UI Team - Concept, Plan, and: help wanted
Greetings ReactOS developers and interested parties!
For the unintroduced, I am your humble UI coordinator. In addition,
I also made some graphics for the project.
-Concept-
I am here to remind you of a post that was made in the ReactOS user
forum, written by crappish (Mikko Tikkanen). In it the author wrote
of the need of a consistent user interface, the need of people that
actually have knowledge of such things, and how these people would
have to be in charge of enforcing such an interface. They should be
familiar with Windows, know how to make things accessible and
newbie-friendly, and have enough creativity to improve on existing
concepts. In addition to that, there should be someone who
represents this team and can interface it with the rest of the
project, and make sure everything is the way everyone wants it to
be. Now, this representative has been chosen. But there is no team
to back him up!
-Recruiting-
So getting down to business. The UI team is recruiting two kinds of
people.
Primarily: Programmers who have sufficient knowledge to hack other
people's code, even if said code is rooted deeply in system
libraries. Skill in writing user interfaces and piecing together
dialog resources. No advanced skills beyond that required. This is
most important, since developers in this category can get straight
to business and get started on improving ReactOS.
Secondarily: Interface concept designers who have advanced
knowledge of human interfacing, easy access, logical positioning,
and the creativity to improve and expand on existing ideas. This is
a secondary category because a) right now there is little to do in
this respect, b) there are already two (counting Mikko?) of these
people in ReactOS, and c) for every 1 concept designer, there can
be up to 10 implementing developers.
Even more appreciated, would be someone who fits both gloves and
can write code AND design interfaces. Sadly, experience proves that
these two traits don't usually come together in one person.
And! Just as important, though not actively recruited, I welcome
icon designers, graphic designers, font designers (that includes
you, wierd_w!), sound effect samplers, and programmers willing to
implement missing UI features (think of things such as extended
cursor/icon support, alpha blitting, runtime freetype
configuration, recycle bin functionality, control panel, autorun
support, etc), on individual application (mail me at mf(a)mufunyo.net).
-Plan-
The plan(tm) to kickstart the UI team is as follows:
Our first goal will be to make the surface experience of ReactOS
familiar. Surface in this context means the things a user will see
during and after bootup. This mainly involves modifying explorer;
to display a consistent and familiar start menu, and to show a
friendly explorer when My Computer or the Explore link is opened.
This means making all the surface icons consistent (my task),
modifying explorer's interface (the 'programmer' category), and
figuring out the best layout for the start menu (the 'designer'
category).
There is no plan past this first task, because I cannot predict how
small or big the team is going to be, what feedback we are going to
get, and how fast things will move.
And that's it for my first big announcement. I hope this will get
some discussion going, and some balls rolling. I would also like to
take this opportunity to request a mailing list for the UI team,
this should have been set up right after the coordinator vote was
over, but it wasn't-- so to whoever's in charge of that, I count on
you. Thanks.
Please reply to this mail only on the general list or to me in
person (if you're not on the list and only get digests), it is only
crossposted in ros-dev to get a wider range of attention.
Thanks for reading,
mf.
_______________________________________________
Ros-dev mailing list
Ros-dev(a)reactos.org
http://www.reactos.org/mailman/listinfo/ros-dev
Rick Langschultz
rlangschultz(a)cox.net (Home)
rlangschultz(a)ellemaespa.com (Work)
rlangschultz(a)email.uophx.edu (School)