Tek-Tips is the largest IT community on the Internet today!
Members share and learn making Tek-Tips Forums the best source of peer-reviewed technical information on the Internet!
-
Congratulations cowski on being selected by the Eng-Tips community for having the most helpful posts in the forums last week. Way to Go!
NX5 toolbar
- Thread starter moog2
- Start date
JohnRBaker
Mechanical
Gee, someone asked a somewhat related question on the UGS BBS today and below is my response to that, which I think will cover this query as well:
The so-called 'Selection Toolbar' is not really a toolbar, at least not in
the sense of how the other Toolbars are implemented. It's actually more
like the Que and Status line in that regard. The problem with implementing
this as a 'normal' toolbar is that toolbars don't provide a good mechanism
for dynamically adding and removing content. Generally that's only done
using an 'active' - 'inactive' (graying-out) scheme, but with the 'Selection
Toolbar' we didn't want to have to populate it with every possible item and
then just gray them out when they were not available. We wanted a more
dynamic scheme that actually displayed or hid items when appropriate.
However, since it could also contain traditional icons, we did provide a way
for users to 'customize' some of the more static content as well as allow
you to add some of your own, but as for the non-toolbar-like behaviors that
you mentioned, we don't really have any control over that since, as I said,
it's NOT really a toolbar.
Besides, one of the virtues of the new behavior IS that users have NO
control over the location or placement of the 'Selection Toolbar' thereby
assuring a consistent and predictable location which addressed one of the
older complaints of always having to go and look for (and in some cases
recovering them when they were inadvertently removed) the Selection Intent,
Snap Point, etc. Toolbars, when they were normal toolbars. This way we
solved both the 'Why does it always move around?' and the 'Why can't I find
it?' problems with the old individual toolbars, albeit by limiting the
overall behavior to that of a more static (at least in terms of placement),
consolidated scheme.
So the bottom line is the Selection Toolbar goes where the Que and Status line goes since it's implemented using a similar set of tools.
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
The so-called 'Selection Toolbar' is not really a toolbar, at least not in
the sense of how the other Toolbars are implemented. It's actually more
like the Que and Status line in that regard. The problem with implementing
this as a 'normal' toolbar is that toolbars don't provide a good mechanism
for dynamically adding and removing content. Generally that's only done
using an 'active' - 'inactive' (graying-out) scheme, but with the 'Selection
Toolbar' we didn't want to have to populate it with every possible item and
then just gray them out when they were not available. We wanted a more
dynamic scheme that actually displayed or hid items when appropriate.
However, since it could also contain traditional icons, we did provide a way
for users to 'customize' some of the more static content as well as allow
you to add some of your own, but as for the non-toolbar-like behaviors that
you mentioned, we don't really have any control over that since, as I said,
it's NOT really a toolbar.
Besides, one of the virtues of the new behavior IS that users have NO
control over the location or placement of the 'Selection Toolbar' thereby
assuring a consistent and predictable location which addressed one of the
older complaints of always having to go and look for (and in some cases
recovering them when they were inadvertently removed) the Selection Intent,
Snap Point, etc. Toolbars, when they were normal toolbars. This way we
solved both the 'Why does it always move around?' and the 'Why can't I find
it?' problems with the old individual toolbars, albeit by limiting the
overall behavior to that of a more static (at least in terms of placement),
consolidated scheme.
So the bottom line is the Selection Toolbar goes where the Que and Status line goes since it's implemented using a similar set of tools.
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
- Thread starter
- #3
ok, i can see you're trying to solve some peoples complaints, but personally, i'd prefer it to be a movable toolbar, and since i have a dual monitor set-up, having a bunch of greyed out icons, doesn't present a space issue.
For people who complain "where is it" should consentrate on better fermiliarisation, in my view
For people who complain "where is it" should consentrate on better fermiliarisation, in my view
JohnRBaker
Mechanical
Perhaps, but so far the vast majority of the people that I've discussed this with seem to indicate that they LIKE the idea of having a single, consistent, easy to find location where all of the various tools and options associated with 'selection', be that objects and/or points, are collected and made available to the user.
Are you also suggesting that perhaps we should convert the Que and Status line into a conventional 'toolbar' so that there would also be more control over where it's placed?
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
Are you also suggesting that perhaps we should convert the Que and Status line into a conventional 'toolbar' so that there would also be more control over where it's placed?
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
It doesn't matter if you make them one way or another, users are always going to have different preferences about where things should be located or how they behave.
I'd just as soon see broken commands fixed as to see more time spent on the interface...that can be done later.
I feel more users complain about that sort of situation than anything else other than money-related stuff.
Tim Flater
Senior Designer
Enkei America, Inc.
Some people are like slinkies....they don't really have a purpose, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs.
I'd just as soon see broken commands fixed as to see more time spent on the interface...that can be done later.
I feel more users complain about that sort of situation than anything else other than money-related stuff.
Tim Flater
Senior Designer
Enkei America, Inc.
Some people are like slinkies....they don't really have a purpose, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs.
JohnRBaker
Mechanical
I'm glad you mentioned "money-related stuff" since the recent enhancements to the User Interface were done in many respects so as to make NX more attractive to new customers since from their point of view, an inconsistent and difficult to understand UI can often be an insurmountable hurtle to them moving to a new software product. Unfortunately, in this business we don't have the luxury of pretending that this "can be done later".
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
- Thread starter
- #7
You don't have an easy task, trying to please all of the people, all of the time, and trying to proiritise, the order in which to do them, but Yes, for me i'd rather be able to undock all toolbars and status bars. For those who'd rather not, then they could stick to the default install.
JohnRBaker
Mechanical
As I said before, we wanted the content of the Selection Bar to be both dynamic and able to collect all 'selection' tools together in one consistent location, something that the standard tools used to define toolbars could not support, hence we had to come up with something that while it had some characteristics of a toolbar, it did not provide a scheme to make it manually dockable. And so we had no choice but to do what we did. Otherwise we would have had to continue to supply multiple toolbars supporting such utility tasks as Selection Filtering, Selection Intent, Snap Points, etc., which, based on recent feedback, was considered unacceptable since there was no practical way to assure consistent placement and availability, something that we had come to realize was a problem for most of our prospects and even many existing customers who were looking for a more predictable and consistant UI.
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
While you (Siemens) may not be able to afford certain luxuries, you can certainly prioritize them a little better to suit both new and veteran users.
I have PRs still open that are over a year old, some that are so old the software version is no longer supported. Since the version support died, the PRs were never closed out and I was never notified of anything being fixed, even in a newer version. All of that only supports the fact that something is being left for later, but at my company's expense once a month.
Tim Flater
Senior Designer
Enkei America, Inc.
Some people are like slinkies....they don't really have a purpose, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs.
I have PRs still open that are over a year old, some that are so old the software version is no longer supported. Since the version support died, the PRs were never closed out and I was never notified of anything being fixed, even in a newer version. All of that only supports the fact that something is being left for later, but at my company's expense once a month.
Tim Flater
Senior Designer
Enkei America, Inc.
Some people are like slinkies....they don't really have a purpose, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down the stairs.
JohnRBaker
Mechanical
Tim,
Mail me a list of your 'open' PR's and I check them and see what I can learn.
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
Mail me a list of your 'open' PR's and I check them and see what I can learn.
John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
NX Product Line
SIEMENS PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA
- Status
