The Sugar HIG Layout
2016-05-09
Responding to Eli’s first wireframe, I knocked it about to make this mockup which I think follows more closely the Sugar HIG layout, with
Essentially I implied a few things:
- make glyph editing selection not a text input (like FontForge has) but a toggle of a row of character cells (similar to kidpix); the order in which they are toggled pushes/pops them off a “stack” to create the string in the canvas;
- the preview panel is autogenerated based on the letters that are toggled, but can be edited like a regular text input widget;
- sizing of the preview panel on the bottom is done ‘implicitly’ by interactively dragging the separator line between the panel and the canvas, similar to the way FontForge’s metrics window auto-sizes based on window dimentions;
The other drawing tools are not included here, but I expect they would be along the primary toolbar.
I wonder where a 3rd level toolbar might fit. Perhaps along the base of the canvas area to show they are related to the canvas (similar to MarioPaint)?
A font editor inherently requires different ‘major modes’ for different experiences in the type design process, especially on a small screen as the XO has. I wonder if the primary toolbar should be reserved for switching between these, sort of like tabs; or even if they should be separate activities… the DTL Font Master suite works this way, an application for drawing, an application for spacing, an application for OpenType feature development, and so on.
I also would like to point out a few things I particularly like about the XO device:
- the greyscale mode of the XO screen is great, and I would like the UI to with it…
- the XO ‘tablet’, ‘ereader’ or ‘gamepad’ mode is fun; I wonder if the activity could work in it, where the only inputs are the d-pad and 4 action buttons…
- The XO has a ‘rotate screen’ button that only really makes sense in ‘tablet’ mode; I wonder if a ‘spacing fonts’ major mode could have a UX that is optimised for use in tablet mode, portrait orentation, using the d-pad/buttons…
I’m looking forward to hearing more about Eli’s next UX ideas, and what insights Yash and Harshita are gaining from reading the defcon and other library sources…