Re: gEDA-user: pcb gtk: Toggle buttons for route styles?

[Colin D Bennett <colin@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 2 Sep 2011 09:46:02 -0700
Andrew Poelstra <asp11@xxxxxx> wrote:

> On Fri, Sep 02, 2011 at 03:02:51AM +0200, Kai-Martin Knaak wrote:
> > Andrew Poelstra wrote:
> > 
> > > Can we use toggle buttons instead of radio buttons for the
> > > route style selector? It would look like so:
> > > 
> > > http://wpsoftware.net/andrew/dump/toggle.png
> > > 
> > > This gives more clickable area and a cleaner look, I think.
> > 
> > The look is still inconsistent. The buttons are centered. By
> > contrast, the tool box and the layer lines are flush-left.
> > 
> > 
> > I'd prefer a more radical change:
> > 
> > 1) Make the route styles as user configurable as the layers. That
> > is, allow to add odr delete styles, change the order they appear 
> > in the GUI, 
> >
> 
> Nope, core changes required. I can allow the addition of arbitrarily
> many temporary layers (and I plan to), but that's pretty much the
> extent of what I can do without making serious changes.
>  
> > 2) Attach accel-keys to route styles. I know, we are running out 
> > of accels. But this is an important omission in the current GUI. 
> > Changing route styles is a very frequent action while manual 
> > routing. How about [ctrl-F1], ... [ctrl-F12]?
> >
> 
> Sure. Unless someone has a better idea, I'll go with these.
>  
> > 3) Add a little preview to the left of the route style name, that
> > indicates the width of the tracks. Actual width in the preview may 
> > be calculated relative to the other route styles. 
> > 
> 
> I considered this, but route styles control more than just line
> size, and I don't think "relative to the other route styles" would
> be very useful.
> 
> > 4) Get rid of the "Route Style" button. Its meaning depends on
> > the currently selected route style. This is very non-standard and 
> > newbie unfriendly. 
> 
> Here is my proposal: add an 's' to "Route Style" and have it load
> this dialog:
> 
> http://wpsoftware.net/andrew/dump/styles-dialog.png

How about a dialog that presents all the route styles in a table, so
they can be easily compared?  It is difficult to compare two styles
(say, to make sure the via size is the same for two styles, or
something) when you can't see both at once.

> > Proposal: Move its function to right-mouse click on every style
> > button. Ideally, this would be complimented by a config page in
> > prefernces in case a user can't do right-clicks (e.g. mac users).
> > This would also be the place to change order config accel keys or
> > add more route styles. Side effect: More space in the right
> > sidebar :-)

+1
I would like right-click to bring up properties for any route style
*without* having to make it the current route style (sometimes I want
to quickly check the settings for a particular style.



Regards,
Colin


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