toolbar icons

[David Nolden]

Am Sonntag 09 August 2009 12:38:59 schrieb Andreas Pakulat:
> For sake of talking about what actually happens, lets look at the following
> three screenshots I've just done after completely removing
> $HOME/.kde/share/(config|apps)/kdev*, i.e. what is shown on initially
> starting kdevelop.
>
> First one without any changes whatsoever:
> http://www.apaku.de/vardata/kdev4_initial_start.png
>
> Two problems are clearly visible:
>  - broken default size, the window needs to me a lot larger
>  - the debugger toolbar needs to be moved to the debug area
>
> However, both quickopen and contextbrowser toolbar are fully visible. Qt
> properly compresses non-widget actions.
>
> Now, lets remove the debugger toolbar:
> http://www.apaku.de/vardata/kdev4_initial_nodbg.png
>
> If we wouldn't have the perspective actions there, we'd have run, build or
> debug visible already, without fixing the mainwindow size even
>
> So, choosing a sane default, netbooks these days seem to have 1024x768
> already, so I've resized the window to that (aproximately, taking a panel
> into account) and we get:
> http://www.apaku.de/vardata/kdev4_initial_sane_size.png
>
> Again, without the area-actions and probably some less separators we'd have
> the 5-6 most-used actions clearly visible and also the quickopen and
> contextbrowser. So the user is surely aware of both widgets and both are
> usable too as the expanded widget they show when activating them resizes
> itself so that it shows all the information needed.
>
> And looking at:
> http://www.apaku.de/vardata/kdev4_initial_ctxbrws.png
>
> I can even use the context browser to see in which function I am in simpler
> code (which is what beginner users will have usually).
You can see a little fraction of the function you're in, and only in 'simple' 
code. It should _always_ show at least the whole function name, else it is not 
really useful.

Am I really the only one who thinks that the screenshots you've sent are ugly? 
Do you really think that is a good user interface for an IDE? Apart from the 
wasted space, it looks cluttered due to the text and the large vertical size 
of the toolbar.

This is how it IMO should look:
http://zwabel.wordpress.com/files/2009/08/kdev5_ui_new_2.png

You see the whole function you're in, and you have the maximum amount of 
vertical space available in the editor, both of which increase productivity.

> Thats it, for me this case is clearly closed as removing the text doesn't
> provide enough added value that make up for the problems caused by it.
I'm not convinced yet, I would like to hear some more opinions.

So, do you really think that this toolbar is better:
http://www.apaku.de/vardata/kdev4_initial_ctxtbrws.png
than this one:
http://zwabel.wordpress.com/files/2009/08/kdev5_ui_new_2.png
? If the majority reall perfers the with-text version, I will be fine.

Greetings, David