[Bf-funboard] Expanding the menus

Ton Roosendaal bf-funboard@blender.org
Wed, 6 Aug 2003 17:46:43 +0200


Hi,

Indeed, looks cool!

I agree with keeping pull down menus static; at least not adopt the MS  
way. What *could* be acceptable though is only presenting editmesh  
options in Mesh editmode, editcurve options in Curve editmode, etc.  
This wouldn't change the order of menu items in the main menu anyway.

To reduce the long menus in a few shorter ones, you could split it in:
"transform"
"select/hide"
"modeling"

All of the options in below's layout fit in these 3 categories.
http://mke3.net:9000/blender/ui/menus/menu_editmesh1.png

You can define something 'modeling' when the topology itself changes  
(like flip edges, fill faces, extrude) whilst 'transform' are grab,  
rotate, scale, shear, recalc normals, shrink/fatten... it's not always  
possible to make the destinction 100% sure though. Is 'proportional  
editing' a 'transform' or 'model' tool?
And then there's of course 'add'....

-Ton-

(BTW; I could not find a screenshot, but I saw in a 3DS demo at  
Siggraph that their context menu has a 4-5 fold menu layouted too. At  
least among it was "properties" and "draw modes". Something for us to  
think over too, for a new toolbox)

(BTW2; getting over a jetlag with a heatwave here in holland is hard...  
;-)


On Wednesday, Aug 6, 2003, at 06:40 Europe/Amsterdam, Matt Ebb wrote:

>
>> For the Edit Curves/Mesh issue, here's my proposal:
>> Those modelling tools (that's what they are) must be fast to access by
>> mouse for the newbies so a top level menu would be just fine
>
> Hmm, just an update on this, I added some 'placeholder' top level  
> menus for
> Mesh, Curve, Ipo, Text and it really made it way too big:
>
> http://mke3.net:9000/blender/ui/menus/menu_longbar1.png
>
> At that size, it's counter-productive since it makes it quite  
> difficult to
> sort through all the different options in the line to find what you're
> looking for. I really don't like the Maya approach of having the  
> different
> Animation, Rendering, Modeling, Dynamics menus either.
>
> The only solution I like at the moment (which isn't that good) is to  
> keep
> Mesh, Curve, etc in a sub-menu, and redesign the toolbox to be better
> organised and laid out, and more context-sensitive. For example, if  
> you are
> in mesh editmode, the toolbox will show a list of relevant mesh editing
> options perhaps a bit similar to the WKEY specials menu. If you are  
> editing
> text, the toolbox will show a bunch of text editing options. All these
> options would be in the menu too in submenus under Edit >, but they  
> just
> wouldn't be as efficient to use (if you want efficiency, then use the
> toolbox or hotkeys).
>
> Anyone have any more ideas on this?
>
> Matt
>
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Ton Roosendaal  Blender Foundation ton@blender.org  
http://www.blender.org