Re: [Gimp-developer] image modes and indications

["David Gowers (kampu)" <00ai99 gmail com>]

On Fri, Jan 27, 2012 at 3:30 PM, c55 inator <c55inator gmail com> wrote:

Error messages and warnings in the status bar are incredibly easy to ignore... I would suggest something like pixelmator [screen capture], which displays overlays on the canvas [here shown with keyboard shortcuts, but the same model can be applied to other notifications].  Displaying information with on-canvas pop-ups like this works well in my experience, as they don't waste any screen space while being there when needed.  Example of a pop-up used for dimensions.

I'm in favor of this general model. MyPaint has recently got canvas overlays, and they're, so far, used to display zoom level changes. I find them both very readable, noticable, and also non-obtrusive. I think a lot of the instructions and information we currently put in the status bar could be usefully moved to an overlay -- tool usage instructions are a prime example, look at the paths tool for an example of something that'll really benefit hugely; and 'wrong mode' info is something I have to deal with a fair bit, it would also be good there.

One other thing is, if we are going to be informing the user that the image mode is wrong, we should offer them a chance to easily correct it.