11 Requests / Improvements

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my_pc_is_amiga
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11 Requests / Improvements

Post by my_pc_is_amiga »

1) Display "metadata" in the icon's information requester (i.e. for jpgs, mpgs, etc).
2) Display Volume name and full path in title bar of workbench drawer/windows. Something like:
"Work:programs/ppaint"
3) iconedit and pointer prefs have not been too useful since the changes in the icons and true color pionter--should be overhauled.
4) Keyshow doesn't work when using notepad. That, is clicking on "a" in Keyshow, "a" does not show up in notepad window.
5) Memacs menu font is using topaz and not the one from the "font" prefs editor.
6) Improvement in AmiPDF to show more kinds of PDFs without errors and to be faster in displaying using newer graphic routines.
7) The "FileCompre" is great! Would like to see some editing capablities to be added. I.e. if I can move the text to/from the left or right file to the other side with a quick click of the mouse. Or even some simple text editing in the windows itself.
8) Index find
9) Move SYS:Documention drawer into HELP: for localization and also create a simple AmigaGuide around this instead of individual files.
10) Make AmigaGuide searchable
11) Datatype improvements for mpgs
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Daedalus
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by Daedalus »

1) Yep, this would be nice, though would require the information to be read from datatypes or similar - hard-coding the metadata extraction would be a lot of work to implement in the icon information itself.

2) Yes, this would be nice, however it should still show as much of the name of the actual drawer as possible when the window is too small to show the complete path (which would be the case for my setup). For example, "Work: ... ppaint" instead of "Work:progra..."

3) Yep. There are newer icon editing programs available that are somewhat alleviate this, such as 32BitIconEd on OS4Depot, which is the result of a successful OpenAmiga project.

4) Keyshow isn't an on-screen keyboard, rather it shows you what characters would be typed with which key combinations. It's an old program, perhaps it could be replaced with a version that supports inserting text or copying text to the clipboard.

5) MEmacs uses an old style Intuition screen and so the old menus are used with it. It even looks old-fashioned on OS 3 for the same reason! MEmacs would need to be updated for that to change, but it's such an old program and there are much better editors out there that it's probably not worth it.

6) Yep.

7) Good idea.

8) That's the sort of thing that slows systems down since the index needs to be constantly updated if it is to be of any use. I always disable it under Windows for example. I guess it might be nice to have it as an option but I don't think it's a good idea to have a hard drive constantly churning in the background when there's no safe shut down method.

9) Not sure that's necessary until there are other languages of the documentation available. Most files in there are only in one language. Perhaps they can be moved to Help: as and when translations are completed, but even then they would be best added to a central help index, since SYS:Locale/English/sys/ isn't as quick to navigate to as SYS:Documentation.

10) Yes, that would be good. The current node is currently searchable, but not the whole document.

11) The datatype system as a whole really needs an overhaul to handle things like video streaming etc. properly. I think it's a much bigger issue than simply updating a datatype.


Well, fingers crossed some of that gets looked at...
xenic
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by xenic »

@Daedalus
4) Keyshow isn't an on-screen keyboard, rather it shows you what characters would be typed with which key combinations. It's an old program, perhaps it could be replaced with a version that supports inserting text or copying text to the clipboard.
Keyshow also injects the characters you click into the input stream. If you open the Keyshow window, then open a shell window and click on letters in the Keyshow window; the lettters will be printed in the shell window. It also sends letters to the C:ED editor, Turbotext and other text editors. It also works with FinalWriter. It even works with the system Calculator program.
AmigaOne X1000 with 2GB memory - OS4.1 FE
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Daedalus
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by Daedalus »

Really? Oops, my mistake. Last time I checked that wasn't the case, but I guess that's a while ago now.

Sounds like a bug in Notepad then, or something funny in the interaction between the input stream and ReAction perhaps...
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broadblues
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by broadblues »

No there no bugs involved, in either keyshow or notepad / editor.gadget / anyother.gadget

Gadgets simply only take input when they are active, and they can't be active when you are clicking on another window.

There was greater dicussion and some attempt to make a 'real virtual keyboard' on this thread at amigans.net

http://www.amigans.net/modules/xforum/v ... mpost93676
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Daedalus
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by Daedalus »

Yeah, that makes perfect sense... But then how does it insert characters into the Shell window, FinalWriter etc?
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broadblues
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by broadblues »

The shell isn't "gadget based" don't know about final writer.
chris
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by chris »

Is KeyShow a "toolbox" window? In which case it shouldn't make Notepad or the gadget lose focus.

Also 11) IIRC Hans was looking into writing an improved animation datatype which would be able to support modern video formats many years ago. I assume he got distracted by other things (drivers).
my_pc_is_amiga
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by my_pc_is_amiga »

"Execute Command" requester comes up with a text entry box -- and it works with typing with keyshow. This I guess is not a "gadget"?

broadblues wrote:No there no bugs involved, in either keyshow or notepad / editor.gadget / anyother.gadget

Gadgets simply only take input when they are active, and they can't be active when you are clicking on another window.

There was greater dicussion and some attempt to make a 'real virtual keyboard' on this thread at amigans.net

http://www.amigans.net/modules/xforum/v ... mpost93676
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Spektro
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Re: 11 Requests / Improvements

Post by Spektro »

Daedalus wrote:8) That's the sort of thing that slows systems down since the index needs to be constantly updated if it is to be of any use. I always disable it under Windows for example. I guess it might be nice to have it as an option but I don't think it's a good idea to have a hard drive constantly churning in the background when there's no safe shut down method.
To avoid the slowdown, one solution comes to my mind. It's not a perfect solution though.

When the user double-clicks an icon, Workbench checks if the file/drawer has been indexed. If it's not, it is added to the index. After the check, the file/drawer is opened. Opening a file or drawer will be a bit slower but you don't need to reindex at regular intervals.

The obvious drawback is that the files and drawers which have never been opened are not indexed. And if the user moves or deletes files and drawers, they are not indexed anymore (index contains obsolete data about them).

Indexes need to be validated (obsolete data removed) now and then or otherwise they will soon contain tons of obsolete data. The validation could be started automatically when the index's size has grown x MBytes since the last validation, or the validation can be done manually, i.e. user starts it whenever he/she feels like it.

You'll be able to find quickly those files/drawers which you have opened at least once. Finding the other files/drawers will be as slow as it currently is.
- Janne Peräaho
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