What are some generally accepted practices for navigating between irregularly placed and sized elements in a canvas (such as controls on a form) using the arrow keys?
For example, if the currently focused element is a tall element (A) whose height encompasses three shorter elements to the right of it (B, C and D):
####### #######
# # # B #
# # #######
# #
# # #######
# A # # C #
# # #######
# #
# # #######
# # # D #
####### #######
Which of these elements should be focused when the user presses the Right arrow? The top element (B)? The one in the center (C)?
What if D was focused before the use user moved focus to A by pressing Left? Should focus return to D when the user subsequently presses Right?
I'm wondering if there are some published guidelines for these scenarios.
I haven't looked into any specific guidelines or anything, but it seems that in the first case, when you're on A and you push Right, it should go to B.
If you're already on C or D when you push A, it probably makes sense to go back to that one. I'm less sure about this one, because the user might have gone to A from the bottom as a "shortcut" to get to B (This makes sense if there are a lot of elements in the right column, so instead of going (Up-Up-Up-Up-Up-Up you go Left-Right).
I think it's also important to note what element 'B' is that you're navigating to. Suppose B is a text box. If you go from A to B, will you assume the user wants to enter input and automatically focus their cursor in the text box? This would give a user immediate use of typing into the box, but immediate problems if he/she wanted to move to C or D instead.
I think it's more important to give the user feedback on which field he/she is in. Windows controls tend to suck for showing a well highlighted field, while in OS X, you get a distinctive highlight around the control that is selected (in most cases).
Just make it a point not to get in the way of the user if they want to go somewhere else. Don't lock down their keyboard after moving into A-D if they only want to move to another element.
In general, navigating through controls should follow the user's natural reading order. In Western cultures, that's left-to-right, top-to-bottom. This has been a usability standard at Microsoft going back to the excellent The Windows Interface Guidelines for Software Design and Microsoft Windows User Experience.
In your example, navigation through the controls should go A-B-C-D-A-...
If you're on A and you hit right, you should go to B.
If you're on D, and you hit Left, there are two options: "going left", which is A, or "going back", which would mean going to B. If you choose the second way, there's no place to get lost, although it can look a bit weird at first.
That said, if you choose the first way, I think the proper would be going to B: no need to remember where you were, just where you are, to know where you'll be. ("State is bad. Don't make the user think about it.")
Take a look at what Microsoft says for Vista applications.
Related
I'm using the Platform Behavior in Construct 2 for a Windows 10 game. In addition to the arrow key, I would like to use the Space bar to get the sprite to jump. Can I tell it to call into the Platform behavior somehow or get it to let me map space bar as well as up arrow to 'jump'?
You certainly can. You can use an action called "Simulate Control" to simulate pressing left, right, or up. So as your event, use Keyboard->on Key Pressed (Space Bar). Then for the action Player->Simulate Control (Up Arrow). This will allow you to press space bar to have your character jump. Additionally, you can turn off default controls for the platform behavior and do custom controls for left, right, and up using the same strategy.
The best way to go about doing this is by adding an event that handles the Space Button. Make sure to add the keyboard object in your layout, and in the event sheet, you want to make an event that handles the keyboard -> on key pressed (choose the spacebar when asked) -> choose whatever object you want to jump with the Platform behavior -> Set Vector Y to whatever increment you'd like to jump. Be sure to list this value as negative. The y-axis in C2 is inverted, so negative numbers mean up.
Hope this helps!
I have a cell (call it A) which is used once in a hierarchically higher cell (call it P). When I place A in P, its borders are rather larger than the actual content of A. When I descend to A and zoom-fit, it is way zoomed out, indicating there is something present way out on the edges.
I may have dragged objects there at one point but currently there is nothing visible. It is driving me crazy in terms of aligning objects, etc.
Is there any way to clean this up or something?
If I recall Cadence used to have a problem with leaving steiners behind when you moved routes. They are not visible but the db treats them as real objects for the bbox calculation. According to Cadence, deleting the objects should not harm anything. Open the layout in edit mode and paste this code into the CIW. This will delete all the steiner objects in your layout. If this was the root cause after saving you should see the bbox return to normal.
cv=geGetEditCellView()
foreach( item cv~>steiners
dbDeleteObject( item )
)
This thread may be considered "dead," but hopefully this helps.
It is possible the layers that are not visible are turned off.
To turn them on, go to the layers pane on the left. (If it is not there you can turn it on by going to Window —> Assistants —> Layers)
You can then click the drop down arrow in the top right corner and click Edit Valid Layers.
Then, click all valid in the Set Valid Layers popup. Click Ok.
Finally, check the Used Layers Only checkbox in the Layers pane. Look for any layers that weren't there before that you don't need.
Usually it happens when you draw the cell in LayoutXL, particularly when you insert pins.
Layer and purpose in these pins are selected separately for some reason, that is why it is easy to enter "impossible" combination.
Nothing happens, then you do it again and continue drawing. But there are several invisible squares that will continuously frustrate your inner perfectionist. You do the following:
Open this cell's layout, switch to Virtuoso window and enter:
lppList=list()
then:
foreach(shape hiGetCurrentWindow()~>cellView~>shapes if( (member(shape~>lpp lppList)==nil) then lppList=cons(shape~>lpp lppList)))
You have created the list with all layers in this layout, you can view it by entering:
lppList
You'll get something like this:
(("NW" "drawing")
("NP" "drawing")
("weird" "guy")
("M1" "pin")
("M3" "pin")
)
If you find a weird guy in this company, just enter the following command:
foreach(shape hiGetCurrentWindow()~>cellView~>shapes if((shape~>lpp == list("weird" "guy")) shape~>lpp = list("prBoundary" "drawing")))
If you see that some squares, labels (or whatever unseen before) appears as prBoundary, just delete it, save, and your layout will be small and shiny again.
I have 2 CCMenuItems A and B
A is a screen-wide transparent button
and B is an actual button that is set to visible when A is touched
Currently, when I'm touching B, A responds with it's selector method and basically B does not respond because the touch is 'taken' by A's selector.
I need B to be responding even though A is a screen-wide button so- Is it possible to prioritise B's selector when it is pushed?
To summarize, I'm toggling B's visibility via A and would like to be able to use B when it is visible.
Is this possible? How can it be done?
for me worked adding one menu in one layer and another menu in other layer
I)
Yes, You can prioritize your CCMenuItems by setting Z-Order.
First button that gets touch is the button with lowest Z-Order.
II)
And if you want to prioritize your CCMenus, you need to setTouchPriority(..) them.
The less priority you give, the earlier your CCMenu will handle the touch. (CCMenu's default value is -128 ).
Either you can set the buttons yourButton.isEnabled to NO or you can just move the A-button off the scene when you don't want it to take input.
It's possible to use an additional CCMenu with a higher z-order for the button B.
I need to design a web form which landlords can use to add rental listings. There are 8 mandatory text boxes and 2 optional text boxes, 11 drop-down lists, 12 checkboxes and one large text area. Any suggestions about how to arrange them in a way that is clean, and uncluttered? My concern is, if the form looks lengthy, they may not want to fill it. So far I have divided the elements on the page into sections, however the page still looks cluttered.
I would suggest that you use 2 pages instead of 1. On the first page, show the 8 mandatory text boxes and follow them with an additional checkbox which makes the 2 optional text boxes appear on being clicked. This means that the user will opt-in for the optional checkboxes making it more acceptable and natural to her. Next, place a submit button which would take the user to the second page.
Put all the 12 checkoxes and the text area on the second page. On page 2, tell the users very clearly that this is the last page they need to fill. They will be less disinclined now since all they need to do is to place a few more clicks.
You may want to split the process of getting all of this data from the user into multiple parts. Conventionally, that would be multiple pages of forms. The problem with that is that it's annoying for the user to have to watch their browser reload the whole page as they move through the form.
A more popular methodology now is to use AJAX to present the larger form in multiple pieces without having to reload the entire page.
In both cases you will need to keep state between each page load or AJAX request so that the back button behaves sanely and the user's previous input reappears as they move backwards (and forwards) through the form.
Unless you have some kind of nifty state-keeping mechanism already written that is generic enough to work for any given form set you may decide to use, welcome to the pain in the ass that is web development.
How about a wizard-style layout?
Break the sections out into separate pages, so components are submitted separately. Make it clear how many sections there are, and how far through the form the user is. Be careful to track the user's progress either in the session, or by keeping state in the form.
This approach makes giving error messages a bit less threatening to users (you never show them the error message "Please correct the following 34 errors").
Edit: Having seen the current form layout, I actually think what you've got at present is very clear, and nicely done.
Do submitters have account profiles that you can use to populate the contact details? If so, I would drop the contact details from the form for creating a listing, and add a review screen that shows all of the information, and gives links for specifying alternative contact details or amending other information. Users then see one screen, plus a review screen with a big "Publish This Listing" button. Amazon's order process uses a good review screen.
Breaking the input into multiple sections is a good idea.
I also like to make most of the input fields invisible, and make them visible as more information is entered. I start with the most important info to be entered first (e.g., name), and as each item is entered, I make further input fields visible. I also give focus to the next logical field that the user is expected to enter as he goes along.
You can use other tricks like highlighting the next field to enter (i.e., changing the background color or surrounding borders of the input field label) to make it even more obvious to the user.
Grouping related fields into separate boxes (with visible borders) may make the info seem less cluttered, too.
This approach makes it look less overwhelming to the user, and makes it more obvious to him what he needs to enter, from start to finish.
Frankly, 33 fields on a single page does not sound all that long for describing a rental listing, especially when 23 of the fields (checkboxes and dropdowns) can default to the most common values. With your current layout, the form almost all fits above the fold. That ain’t bad.
I’d be very cautious about splitting it into separate pages (e.g., as a wizard). First of all, that will take the user longer, because now you’re adding navigation and re-orientation time. Second of all, it will seem to take longer; the user will be like, “Geez, I have fill out a multi-page form?” Thirdly, users can’t tell how much work is expected of them when some of it is hidden on other pages (or by AJAX tricks). Some will not fill out the form at all assuming the worse. Others will abandon it part-way through because they either didn’t plan enough time for it, or just got tired of hitting Next indefinitely. You can mitigate this last problem by saying up front how many pages there are, and showing the user’s progress through them, but that just accentuates the fact that it’s multi-page, and therefore “long.”
IMO, all it needs is some lighter graphic design. I’d drop the “reverse video” section titles and the green background on alternating sections and make it all white. Use color and/or bold text for the section titles. You can combine the Property Description section label with the field label to reduce clutter and redundancy. Consider putting the Pets and Parking fields on the same line as Laundry then spreading the Unit Details fields out vertically so the mis-alignment of the fields is not so noticeable. Alternatively, size the Unit Detail fields so that they are better aligned. Maybe you can drop the “How do you want to be contacted?” field. I’d expect that if users don’t want to be contacted by one of the means, they simply don’t fill out that field.
Other than that, be sure your users understand the importance of these fields –why filling them out helps them find the right renters. Users don’t mind filling out a lot of fields if it’s clear that each benefits them. It’s when users feel like they're disclosing a lot of data to benefit you that they get resentful and reluctant. The importance of the fields you have seems self-evident to me, but maybe you should include a link that explains the purpose and value of the fields.
Finally, make sure there’s not too much clutter and competition from the “standard” page elements (e.g., sidebar menus, legal information).
I'd like to write a Linux screen magnifier that's customized to my liking. Ideally, the magnified window would be a square about 150 pixels wide that follows the mouse cursor wherever it goes.
Is it possible to do this in X11? Would it be easier to have an application window that follows the mouse around, or would it be better (or possible) to forget about the window altogether and just make the mouse pointer a 150x150 square that magnifies whatever's underneath?
Look at the source to xeyes?
This actually already exists, it's called Xmag (do a Google search for additional info). You might want to check out the source code for it if you want to know how it works.
EDIT: looks like I misread your question a little bit... if you want a magnified square to follow the mouse pointer around, I suppose it should be possible, but I don't know the technical details of how you'd do it. Regardless, the place to start is probably by looking at Xmag as a starting point.
I am unsure if this can run as its own app or would have to be integrated into your window manager. Either way, you would need libx11 (might have a different name from distro to distro). Also, I would suggest taking a look at swarp. I know this is not even close to what you are talking about, but the source code is only 35 lines and it shows what can be done with libx11.
I would personally make that a frameless window that always stays atop with a 1px hole in the middle. The events that the user makes (Mouse clicks, keypresses, whatever) is passed to the window below.
And when the user moves it's cursor it is ought to be visible to your window and you just move it over a bit. For the magnifying part, well - that is left as an exercise to the reader (Because I do not know how to do that as of yet ;-).
Texworks comes with such a feature to inspect the pdf resulting from typesetting a latex source. You can also choose between a square or a circular magnifier. See https://www.tug.org/texworks/ for access to the code which can serve a launchpad.