Jop and I have been working on a new design for the smart gui. If you have ideas, or suggestions, now is your time to get involved. I am tracking it on my forum. I have, for convenience post a screen shot and the glade file. This way, those of you who want to more actively participate, can, and those of you who just want to look and comment, can also do so. This way, no body is left out. http://thecompletecomputerresource.com/for...x.php?topic=137

Later on, I may make a video tutorial/presentation.

You can make your suggestions or ideas here in this thread, or on my forum.


I'm getting some good feedback here http://lists.labix.org/pipermail/smart-lab...ugust/date.html

What do y'all say?


You can also follow along http://downloads.thecompletecomputerresour...rt/smart%20gui/ Where I have the glade file and the screenies

I don't want to register to yet another forum so I write it here.
I assume this is the latest pic.
The icon bar shouldn't be on the packages tab. It should be above the tab under the menu bar. Besides it should be smaller.
What's that combo box left of the package list?
Put back the radio buttons for the search. Can we search for filenames in the future versions?
You should make the design for the other two tabs too.
I guess that's all for now.

The icon bar is actually above the packages tab See this screenie to help http://downloads.thecompletecomputerresour...i_channels2.jpg

I haven't done the configue tab yet, cause that involves a lot more work, but it's coming. I will implement all the search features with the completion of this gui.

I guess your saying you need more screenies.

Make it look a bit more like Synaptic and change the view items from hide XXX to show XXX

This is not gui related but, when using the KsmartTray widget can you add a function, whereby the user can specify how frequently repo's are polled for updates?

No I meant the icon (or quicklaunch bar) shouldn't be on the "Packages" tab. If you click on the "Channel" tab you can't see it. It's only visible when you click on the "Packages" tab. At least on the screenie I linked it's there. It should be under the menu bar and above the tabs (between them) like it is on virtually every application. Just take a look at your browser now for example. And it's too big for my liking.
What's that combo box?

The code of ksmarttray would have to be changed. It is not my goal to work on ksmarttray.

OK, I'll work on that. I hadn't realized it before. I may also make the icons a bit smaller.

I did make some of the changes you suggested. http://downloads.thecompletecomputerresour...screen%20shots/

These are current screenies.

thecompletecomputerresource or thelongesturliveseenforalongtime.com?

Follow the gnome hig. Don't follow everything exactly if you don't want, but it's got plenty of smart suggestions on how to construct UI's and keep them consistent.

http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/hig/

what sticks out to me in the screenies:
* no spacing whatsoever. cramped!
* Icons go on buttons, not menu items. What's that find thing on the menu? Make it a button and move it to the toolbar.
* Usually toolbar buttons have larger icons
* Use GTK stock icons only.
* Buttons on tabs??

And the other thing. it's fun to plan the UI, but it's even better to write the code. Before you've even designed the UI you know how the program's going to work and what many of the routines will be. I've seen lots of projects dead in the water, and they've only ever designed the UI.

James

Yeah, I know. I've been with the smart developer for like a year now. I wrote the documentation for smart. Been studying python and rpm. So yep, I know.

I have also updated the gui, so I'd encourage you to check again.

The buttons on tabs was just so I could label them, so y'all would have an idea of what it means, or looks like. It wasn't a button, but actually a menu, where I took everything out except for the name.

Someone complained about how big the buttons were, so i made them smaller. I can certainly make them bigger.

Care to elaborate on the spacing?

I like this one. The only thing left for me is the find button on the menu bar. The search function should be on the icon bar too. But not as a button. Put a text field and radio buttons or combo box there. And make that text field default (if you can setup tab order in Glade).

That's my next step. At least we're getting to the point where we like it.

I had another idea. What if I took the glade designed gui of smart, and made it web based. So you could use the gui as a stand alone front end, or in a browser. http://gtk.php.net/manual/en/glade.gladexml.php

But the regular GUI remains?
Anyway browser based package managing doesn't make too much sense to me. I certainly wouldn't use it. I don't even know who would prefer it over the regular GUI.

and adds a pile of security issues.

James

It provides another option to the user. It'd help keep it lightweight. And no, no security issues. Not if it's done right.

Security isn't that simple, otherwise all the major projects would never be releasing patches and security updates.

As for "lightweight" -- a web browser (firefox anyone?), web server, processes for dynamic pages (php/python/ruby/perl/etc)... isnt lightweight. It's overkill. Feature Creep.

Nor can i think of any usage situation where this thing would actually be useful. It'd be slower, have a much weaker UI, and be far less capable. It'd be far more complex, heavier on the system, and putting something in a browser that doesnt need to be, gaining nothing extra by being there.

James

Always use the proper tool for the job. A hydrospanner isn't particularly good for juicing your fruit, and a web browser should only be used as...a web browser.

Well said, security isn't easy. Did you forget that I wrote the security overview? You have valid points, but at the same time, I am not sure you follow me. What I am suggesting is an alternative to the stand alone. Kind of like webmin. Webmin is light weight, written in php and perl. I read about an iptables tool that is web based using glade (I came across this while trying to find out if this could be done). So it can be done, and is being done.

Webmin is for making remote system administration easy. So a web interface for iptables makes sense. But for installing\deleting on a remote machine I can't imagine a better solution than the plain old CLI over SSH though I admit I'm far from being an expert.
Anyway if you're determined to do it, and it seems like you are, I don't wanna stop you.
One more thing about GUI design:

I found it here (post on 27th of july 2005).

Good stuff dexter11. I shall do my best.