Improved mission menu

[SeriousToni]

What happens if the mission file name is too long though..?

 

The current way of handling long mission names is simply cutting them at the end of the text box. If it is possible to add a "..." at the end via coding, I think this would be the solution.

 

And I assume mission details button/link with handle all the extra info and screenshots..?

See:

Note that the mission details section is not needed anymore as it only had infos about name, date, size and author which are displayed now inside the missions list. If the user clicks on Mission Details after selecting a mission, it will lead to the pop up window we have at the moment (mission info, screenshots, etc.).

 

If we're looking to save space on the download menu, the entire "selected for download" section should be removed. Missions selected for download could be designated by putting a checkmark after the name in the Missions Available for Download section, or by a checkbox before the name.

Yes, if we are able to use checkboxes like that, then we could extend the mission download menu to the right and cut out the selected missions menu.

 

@ c0mputer-fr0d:

Could you please try changing the background image of the downloader to the HD one and set the base screen width & heights (not your actual monitor resolution) to 1920x1200 and see what happens?

You can find the HD background here: http://i.minus.com/ibuBLGann5aBPo.png

It would be good to know if we can actually design the menus in HD instead of 640x480 and then let it scale up.

Edited August 27, 2015 by SeriousToni

[Nico A.]

The functionality is still the same with rearranged screen elements and more space available due to the loss of the info section. If we want to extend the filters list

I don't think that's necessary. Name, Size and Update should suffice What do the others think?

 

If we're looking to save space on the download menu, the entire "selected for download" section should be removed. Missions selected for download could be designated by putting a checkmark after the name in the Missions Available for Download section, or by a checkbox before the name.

If that's possible, that'd be great. You don't have to click "Select For Download" each time after selecting a mission. And then there's room for the full mission name... or a sneak peek of the mission details.

[SeriousToni]

If that's possible, that'd be great. You don't have to click "Select For Download" each time after selecting a mission. And then there's room for the full mission name... or a sneak peek of the mission details.

 

Something like this? http://i.minus.com/i6baBpxKkSgzh.png

[Airship Ballet]

RUDE

[Springheel]

 

 

Something like this? http://i.minus.com/i6baBpxKkSgzh.png

 

Something like that, although I think there could be better use of space. The file size of the pk4 isn't particularly important, IMO, where as a player I'd like to have a bit of information about the mission. The information from the wiki, including "series" and "Mission Type" would be much better to have as sort fields.

 

I'd do something kind of like this below, in terms of what information to show. The fields at the top are sortable. The extra info at the bottom appears when you click on a mission title, and you can then select it for download (which bolds the name or adds a checkmark or does something else to indicate it is selected).

 

As a player, I think this would give me a much better sense of which missions I might actually want to download.

[c0mputer-fr0d]

I can do that for you toni and screenshot it

[SeriousToni]

 

Something like that, although I think there could be better use of space.

Looks good but it is like the old one full with information and overloaded with elements. I mostly try to give more space, but I can try to merge these two designs and see what comes out. I have to use a smaller font size for this then.

 

I can do that for you toni and screenshot it

Very nice! Then we can find out if our GUI dreams will come true

[Springheel]

Looks good but it is like the old one full with information and overloaded with elements

 

 

I thought the idea was to give players more information and reduce the amount of clicking necessary?

[161803398874989]

RUDE

You're welcome to make a quality mission and stick my name on it, if you like.

[SeriousToni]

 

I thought the idea was to give players more information and reduce the amount of clicking necessary?

 

Yes but I feel personally that more information is not useful everytime as it blurres the eye instead of give a clear focus on what you can do

 

I adapted your scheme to the current one: http://i.minus.com/ibcnKmMBTvOGyb.png

At the top we still have our list with possible filters to sort the list. On the right are the buttons for PageUp/Down or a scrollbar located, if we manage to implement it

The bottom shows the map information, if any entry has been clicked (with a sneek peek of the mission info like Nico A. proposed before).

Also you have the action buttons at the bottom, where you can do further things like adding maps to the list or start downloading, etc.

 

So the user has a clear view of: 1. sorting elements at the top; 2. read & choose elements from the list in the middle; 3. taking action with the selections finally at the bottom (as the eye goes from top to down too)

 

Any thoughts?

[Springheel]

Any thoughts?

 

 

I'm not sure you'll be able to design it for a widescreen format like that...what happens to the column width if someone isn't using widescreen?

 

I'd shift around some of the buttons a bit, but the basic information is good.

[stumpy]

only the iniitial windowDef Desktop has to be rect 0, 0, 640, 480, windowDefs further in can be rect 0, 0, 1920, 1080.

 

if you change the actual source code to allow for a bigger initial window size in the guis file then you would have to change every gui file, this would include all the readables, hud, loading screen animations, all menus, because they would all scale to fit 640 x 480 of the new size.

[SeriousToni]

 

I'm not sure you'll be able to design it for a widescreen format like that...what happens to the column width if someone isn't using widescreen?

 

I'd shift around some of the buttons a bit, but the basic information is good.

I don't know how TDM handles that actually. Wouldn't it change the picture / font size automaticly by resizing?

If we get into horizontal space problems, we still can leave out one of the columns or make them all shorter in width generally (which I wouldn't prever).

 

only the iniitial windowDef Desktop has to be rect 0, 0, 640, 480, windowDefs further in can be rect 0, 0, 1920, 1080.

 

if you change the actual source code to allow for a bigger initial window size in the guis file then you would have to change every gui file, this would include all the readables, hud, loading screen animations, all menus, because they would all scale to fit 640 x 480 of the new size.

Hmm.. But wouldn't we only have to change the background images of the menus to HD ones and then calculate the new positions of current elements with some formula to get the acurate new X & Y?

 

 

Edited August 28, 2015 by SeriousToni

[stumpy]

the windowDef Desktop{

 

rect 0, 0, 640, 480

 

}

 

isn't the screen size, its the initial size of the guis widget, so you could just put the hd pictures in the same places as the low defnition pictures, then the widget auto resizes itself to your current screen size.

 

even if your screen size was 64 x 64 the guis widget would still start off at rect 0, 0, 640, 480

Edited August 28, 2015 by stumpy

[SeriousToni]

Yes, and that is why every menu looks blurry on modern computers, since it stretches it up from 640 to 1920px. We want to try to set the GUI widget size to 1920px as standard, so we start at high quality instead of low.

[Springheel]

The images aren't 640x480, they're 1024x1024. But the GUI screenspace has to be divied up as if it were 640x480.

[SeriousToni]

Oh wow that's confusing Why were the images created in 1:1 format instead of 4:3 or 16:9?

[Springheel]

Because images have to be in powers of 2 or they are distorted by the engine.

[SeriousToni]

Oh okay, I never knew that, thanks for clearing it up.

So the background image should be like 2048x2048 and the GUI (widget) can calculate itself to the according screen size, as soon as the coordinates for the screen elements are known, from what I understood.

 

It's not easy to do a proper GUI if you don't know how it works technically in the engine I must say

Hopefully with a bit of trying around in the code we can manage to solve this and use it to update the rest of the GUIs later too, to have a constant look and feel. Let's see what c0mputer-fr0d can work out with the HD testing image (you'd have to stretch it to 2048x2048 according to Springheel to get it working ingame) and then tell me what you need

Edited August 28, 2015 by SeriousToni

[grayman]

Don't forget that the loading and briefing screen guis provided by missions are all based on 640x480. We can't change those. And we can't break them.

 

If the engine is changed to expect a higher resolution than that, will it automatically scale up a WindowDef of 640x480?

[SeriousToni]

Hm good point - we'll have to wait for the test, to see what the upscale will actually do.

For the mission screens: Shouldn't the text scale up properly? (or we tell it to) And the pictures shouldn't change if I understand it correctly, right? Since what is happening now is that they're based on 640 (or 1024) and get upscaled to 1920 e.g. If we can't change / edit them, they will be upscaled from 1024 (or whatever smaller) to 1920 base resolution (or what screen size you use) which would be the same result.

 

EDIT: An idea to respond to the widescreen / 4:3 screen issue could also be try centering the background 16:10 image and instead of shrinking the width to 16:9 / 4:3 it would get cut off. Like if we had a base container in 4:3 which contains all the GUI and then a redundand background to the left and right (off of the paper / book) which you only see in 16:9 / 16:10. Don't know if the GUI code allows something like this though.

 

Container would be the book and the blue area the redundant background which gets cut off more and more on 16:9 and 4:3 screens:

Edited August 28, 2015 by SeriousToni

[c0mputer-fr0d]

http://postimg.org/image/8dhxxd7pr/

 

I think I might have got something wrong , it looks all stretched and stuff. My monitor's max resolution is 1280x1024 so maybe that's it.

Edited August 28, 2015 by c0mputer-fr0d

[Byrgius]

I just returned from holidays and... wow! Had no idea this topic would cause so much interest! Really happy to see this

[SeriousToni]

http://postimg.org/image/8dhxxd7pr/

 

I think I might have got something wrong , it looks all stretched and stuff. My monitor's max resolution is 1280x1024 so maybe that's it.

Haha wow, that looks funny indeed

Did you use the original image I posted above? Because the problem could be that its size is 1920x1200, and Springheel wrote, images have to be a size with the power of 2. So maybe it works with 2048x2048, see:

 

http://i.minus.com/iXoc7zjkxnRr8.png

 

I just returned from holidays and... wow! Had no idea this topic would cause so much interest! Really happy to see this

Well it was a nice idea and now we all turned into little, crazy ants who try working it out

[SeriousToni]

Well looks like the crazy ants fell asleep

 

c0mputer-fr0d are you still there for waking us?