[Qgis-developer] What will be in QGIS 2.0

[Larry Shaffer]

On Wed, Jul 11, 2012 at 5:26 AM, Tim Sutton <lists at linfiniti.com> wrote:
> Hi All
>
> Marco and I have been discussing version 2.0 and wanted to bring the
> discussion onto the list. In particular we are interested in:
>
> - When is a reasonable date to aim for the release?
> - What features will be part of 2.0?
> - What things are we going to clean away for the release?
>
> ...
>
> Are there any other things that folks would like to add to the
> discussion for the roadmap for version 2.0?

I'm no math or C++ whiz, so helping with the intricacies of some parts
of QGIS are categorically beyond me right now. One area where I would
like to help, and would love to see finished for 2.0, is a systematic
update of the user experience to be consistent and adaptable across
platforms. I don't necessarily mean introduce new GUI ways of doing
things, but fix the current problems with consistency and implement
means of making it easier to adjust in the future.

Towards this end, I propose the following:

* A complete application-wide GUI audit with a full listing of things
needing fixed or updated on the wiki. This would be done with respects
to any current interface guidelines, which could be updated as
differing, but necessary, use cases are recognized.

Examples:

- Clean up all core GUI elements to meet current guidelines.
- Many dialog's sizes/state/column widths, etc. are not recorded/restored.
- Many form elements and dialogs do not expand or scale consistently.
- Font sizes vary drastically in some areas between platforms.
- Many long operations differ on whether they show a progress bar.
- Use of push or tool buttons for specific operations is inconsistent.
- Very few GUI elements leverage Qt's What Is? contextual help.
- Differing platform conventions need addressed where inconsistent.

* Look at implementing Qt stylesheets *sparingly* for the interface
and plugins. Many inconsistencies, especially fonts, can be handled
with the use of application-wide stylesheets specific per platform
(e.g. qgis_ubuntu.qss). Application preferences regarding style would
need to be programmatically integrated with stylesheets.

* QgisInterface could be updated to offer methods to retrieve the
current stylesheet or interface style settings. This would seriously
help plugin authors, who do not always work/test on multiple
platforms, which is one reason why many plugins lack GUI cohesion with
the main app. All plugins, or possibly only those whose parent is the
main window, could inherit the main app's stylesheet.

* Create a simple HIG GUI checklist for plugin authors to follow,
maybe with some good examples. This also could be a crosscheck used by
admins when considering plugin submissions to the plugin repository.

The focus here would be to update the app to have a consistent GUI
baseline, which follows a known set of human interface guidelines, and
to offer plugin authors the ability to effectively work with it.

Regards,

Larry


> Regards
>
>
>
> --
> Tim Sutton - QGIS Project Steering Committee Member (Release  Manager)