From: Silvan <dmm...@us...> - 2004-06-09 14:37:46
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On Wednesday 09 June 2004 04:57 am, Chris Cannam wrote: > 1. I'm not entirely persuaded by "Document". I think you might be > failing your own guideline of looking at this purely from a > non-technical perspective. I'm not at all sure anyone would expect > MIDI setup, for example, to be under Document, and I'm not sure > anyone either would find it obvious what the difference between File > and Document is supposed to be. I would never expect to find MIDI setup here, but I would never expect a program would be designed around the concept of having the MIDI setup inextricably woven into every single individual composition I produced with it either. I did this very much on purpose to emphasize the relationship. To my mind, having it as a top level implies, incorrectly, that the Studio is somehow universal. > I do mostly find the grouping of functions under Document mostly a > comfortable one -- until I get to the clef and key functions in > notation, which are absolutely not document settings by any stretch > (unlike time and tempo which I can understand). Fair point on that indeed. A bit of a gray area there. Keys can be made to affect the whole document, or they can be entirely local. Clefs are more firmly a local phenomenon. It makes sense keeping them in proximity to each other as they are often used hand in hand. > I don't think this > suggests that time/tempo and clef/key don't belong together, I just > think it reinforces that Document is not quite the right word. I would agree on that point entirely. s/Document/SomethingBetter/g at will. But I still think the Studio belongs here. I'm thinking "Composition" might be a contender. > 2. Segments -> Edit With and Segments -> Split or Join are good. I > still find the Segments menu a bit overwhelming though. Isn't there > something else that we can find in common among some of the functions > on it? Should the ones that set tempo be on the same menu (Document > or whatever it is) with the time/tempo functions? > 3. "Edit Tools" sounds like a verb phrase. Editing Tools? Cursors and Tools? > 4. I did a bit of a double-take on Reset MIDI Network in Tools, but > it does make sense. It might also make sense to have a Panic > function in there. > Notation and matrix (mostly notation -- matrix generally works well): > 5. I don't think it's acceptable to have menus nested three-deep for > simple functions like Beam Group or Untie Notes. I realise this is a > troublesome thing for me to say, because the categorisation under > Notes (which in principle I think is good) does really seem to call > for it, but I honestly don't think we should do it. Many of the > nested functions are ones that are obvious enough that you might want > to use them quite a bit but perhaps not universal enough that you > would actually remember the shortcut or necessarily be familiar with > the icon. I find I use the icons for all of the things in here I typically use. Anything else would be in the category of something I use infrequently enough to go digging through the menu for it once in awhile. Probably, anyway. I haven't given it that much of a test drive to see how annoying it is. I do like it much better having concepts I relate together in my mind being in the same place though. > 6. I had really hoped to get rid of the word Transforms. I think > it's ugly, ungainly, and unhelpful (anything can be described as a > transform if you really like -- that's probably why I used it in the > first place). OK, fine. Adjust seems reasonable. > and maybe > even note style and stem direction can fall under that category too. You think so? I suppose maybe, since they don't add or attach anything *to* the note, yes, I could agree with that. > If we could move them out of Notes we could possibly bring the whole > Notes->Group submenu up a level inline into Notes and bring > Marks->Fingering and Marks->Slashes up a level too (as immediate > submenus of Notes). If we then brought the Tie functions inline into > the Notes->Indications submenu, that would deal with all the > troublesome three-level nestings, perhaps without too much pain. I think I can drink to that. > 7. It's not entirely clear to me why quantization gets three > top-level entries in the transforms menu in the matrix, but only a > submenu in notation. Though I can probably live with it now there's > a toolbar entry and shortcut for it. I was probably being inconsistent. Shall I tweak this now, or do we want to debate a bit longer? -- Michael McIntyre ---- Silvan <dmm...@us...> Linux fanatic, and certified Geek; registered Linux user #243621 http://www.geocities.com/Paris/Rue/5407/ |