[Qgis-developer] Digitising icons

[Hugentobler Marco]

Hi Tim,

>Look at the before and after screenies Im attaching. Im suggesting as
>a short term fix to use the field names and row headers so the table
>effectively has one column. This should require minimal code changes
>and substantially increase productivity when navigating with the
>keyboard using tab. I realise you can use use down and up arrows to
>move between fields, but many people instinctively use tab for this
>purpose which requires 2 keypresses eaach time.

Ah yes, this makes sense. I thought you were talking about the attribute table, not the attribute dialog. Therefore my confusion.

>I dont think making it a drop down is a good idea. When digitising
>those tools are frequently accessed and by moving them into a drop
>list, we save space yes but we break Fitz' Law. Think about a typical
>workflow:
>
> - enable layer editing (1 click)
> - choose line capture icon (1 click)
> - capture line (n clicks)
> - enter attributes (+1 click for ok)
> - save layer editing (1 click)
> - resume layer editing (1 click)
>
>Even in that simple scenario where other digitising tools arent being
>used it becomes this with a drop down icon toolbox:
>
>
> - enable layer editing (2 click)
> - choose line capture icon (2 click)
> - capture line (n clicks)
> - enter attributes (+1 click for ok)
> - save layer editing (2 click)
> - resume layer editing (2 click)
>
>Perhaps worse than the number of clicks is the break in workflow as
>you need to do the icon selection process. I think we can be more
>smart about combining tools into single icons where they are mutually
>exclusive and win toolbar space back that way rather.

My suggestion was to have the toggle editing button outside of the dropdown list. Therefore, in your example, there would only be one additional click with the dropdown list (choose line capture icon (2 click)). The capture line button stays selected when toggling editing on/off.

But ok, in other situations where users change tools very often (e.g. alternate capture / vertex modifications), there will be more clicks. For those situations, a floating window could be nice. 

>I think we can be more
>smart about combining tools into single icons where they are mutually
>exclusive and win toolbar space back that way rather.

This is a good solution for the capturing icons, but that saves only two positions. Or are there other icons that could be removed like this? And the number of editing tools may still grow in future.

I had a look how other GIS handle the editing icons:

Jump: floating window
udig: dropdown list
arc gis: dropdown list

Regards,
Marco

> --
> Dr. Marco Hugentobler
> Institute of Cartography
> ETH Zurich
> Technical Advisor QGIS Project Steering Committee
>


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