From: mth <mt...@mt...> - 2002-12-02 15:54:02
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Many configuration settings show up on both the menus and in the Preferences dialog. For example atom style, bond style, label style showAtoms, showBonds, showVectors, showHydrogens I made a serious effort to make the checkbox behavior consistent between the two ... but I failed. With the menus constructed the way they are (from Properties/Jmol-resources.properties & Jmol.properties) I can't figure out a way to do it. (It may be possible to do it with some JavaBeans functionality, but I don't know how to do that yet.) Q: How useful is it to have these items in both places? Q: Do people frequently switch representations? Q: Could we remove some of these items from the menus so that they live in the PreferencesDialog only? Miguel |
From: Egon W. <eg...@sc...> - 2002-12-02 20:33:36
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On Monday 02 December 2002 16:53, mth wrote: > Q: How useful is it to have these items in both places? Menu items are not persistent between Jmol sessions... Preferences are. > Q: Do people frequently switch representations? Often, i.e. I often switch on/off hydrogen, charges, labels... I less often switch on/off antialiasing, etc... Note that User X turns on shading when exporting images, but does his rotation work/analysis without shading... > Q: Could we remove some of these items from the menus so that they live > in the PreferencesDialog only? I am not sure how Jmol was behaving in the past... but I imagine this design handy: 1. the preferences are the boot settings... i.e. the values the several rendering options when Jmol is started... 2. we should define a list of options that the users is likely to change within one Jmol session. These should have menu items, the others not... The option values toggled with the menu do not alter the preference settings, which only indicate the startup values Not sure if I make myself perfectly clear... but anyway, here is a second try: 1. For labeling, shading, etc, both menu and preferences exist... The preferences define the boot settings and the initial menu settings... In the Jmol session itself the menu settings do not change the boot setting, but change only the current working settings... Changing the preferences changes the boot settings and the current working settings. 2. antialiasing, etc only occur in the preference dialog and determine both the boot settings and the current working settings... Did this help? Egon |
From: mth <mt...@mt...> - 2002-12-03 23:11:16
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I just checked in some code which makes the menu checkboxes and radiobuttons work properly. In addition, they now are consistent with the settings as set by the preferences dialog box. - the menu checkbox state is updated to reflect the current settings this did not work correctly in the past if the settings were changed via the preferences dialog box - the menu radio buttons for display style now are updated to accurately reflect the current settings - modifications made in the preferences dialog box are saved only if you hit OK - hitting cancel does not undo changes which were made to the settings ... but it never did. Miguel > I am not sure how Jmol was behaving in the past... but I imagine this > design handy: > > 1. the preferences are the boot settings... i.e. the values the several > rendering options when Jmol is started... Yes > 2. we should define a list of options that the users is likely to change > within one Jmol session. These should have menu items, the others not... If we came up with a list I think it would be good. I personally think that the layout could/should be improved. I would like to clean up the Preferences Dialog and then use it. > The option values toggled with the menu do not alter the preference > settings, which only indicate the startup values I think it is hard to do this and make the UI consistent. It is important that the user have visual feedback and see the changes that are being made while settings are being modified in the PreferencesDialog. Once the PreferencesDialog is open the user can switch focus back to the menus and change the settings. I suppose it would be possible to have the display rendering change to reflect which window has the focus. If the preferences dialog has the focus then the molecule is rendered according to the Preferneces settings. The behavior of the code I just checked-in is not perfect. But I think it is significantly better than the previous behavior. Try it out and let me know what you think. > > Not sure if I make myself perfectly clear... but anyway, here is a > second try: > > 1. For labeling, shading, etc, both menu and preferences exist... > The preferences define the boot settings and the initial menu > settings... In the Jmol session itself the menu settings do not > change the boot setting, but change only the current working > settings... Changing the preferences changes the boot settings and > the current working settings. > 2. antialiasing, etc only occur in the preference dialog and determine > both > the boot settings and the current working settings... > > Did this help? Yep! |