[Scummvm-devel] GUI options/layout/etc

[Arnaud Boutonné]

Hi fuzzie,

I'll quickly summarize the opinions I expressed on IRC:
- I agree for the 'extra options' tab. I guess we'll get the best of it the
day we have a dynamic layout, so that we may also add game-specific options
(such as the BASS alternative intro, for example)
- Your searches about the output rate combo-box make it sound like it's
completely useless for users (if not at all) nowadays. It would be great
that someone tells the opposite and clarifies the situation
- For the 'Music' tab, as I'm not a purist, I have nothing to object. Maybe
a mockup screen is the next step?

I also wonder if we wouldn't benefit in introducing a 'standard' and an
'expert' mode we could use to hide some more complex options which confuse
users.

Best regards,
Arnaud



On Thu, Nov 24, 2011 at 11:04 AM, A. Milburn
<fuzzie at users.sourceforge.net>wrote:

> Hi,
>
> A few ramblings about GUI options so they don't just get lost in the IRC
> logs. They're not complete but they *are* trying to be practical rather
> than ideal solutions which we might never get around to implementing
> (also I don't have much time this week, so if I said something really
> stupid, sorry!):
>
> * I'd like to suggest just adding an 'Extras' tab for all the argued-over
>  enhancements. 'EGA undithering', 'mixed AdLib/MIDI mode', 'original
>  save/load dialogs', 'copy protection' and 'prefer synthesized effects'
>  could all go there, it would provide a single place for users to go
>  for this stuff, and it would help with arguments about defaults if we
>  can just have an obvious place in the global options where people can
>  go and make their game 'better', without compromising the idea that
>  we should default to original interpreter behaviour.
>
>  There's enough space for 6 checkboxes in there, more if we made the
>  labels shorter. I realise that there might be an argument about this
>  making the UI trickier on 320x200, but it doesn't seem that bad to me.
>  The only trouble would be that we don't have the space for single-game
>  options (like the alternative intros), but as far as I know no-one is
>  too bothered about those.
>
>  I think we can probably get rid of other less useful options and free
>  up some space anyway, which leads me to the rest of this..
>
> * The 'Output rate' combobox seems a bit pointless to have in the main
>  GUI. A lot of the backends override this themselves, and everything
>  except some of the SDL-based ones (not all) and the PSP backend
>  ignore the config setting.
>
>  We seem to default to 22khz on desktop platforms, something which dates
>  back in commit history to the first sound support. Can we not default
>  to 44khz on backends which can reasonably handle that and don't just
>  ignore the config anyway, and otherwise leave this as a fairly obscure
>  config option?
>
> * The 'Graphics mode' combobox seems a bit oddly used too - on various
>  backends it's empty because there's no choice of mode, the Dreamcast
>  backend provides one single mode, the PSP backend seems to use it to
>  provide 'keep aspect ratio' and 'full screen' options. Obviously it
>  *is* used on many backends though, so this is just an observation.
>
> * Is the 'MT-32' tab necessary for backends which can't be connected
>  to real hardware but can run the emulators? Would it be possible to
>  just move the combobox to the 'MIDI' tab if the only options are
>  emulators for which we know whether they support GM/MT-32 natively,
>  or are those options important even with an emulator used?
>
> * In that vein, can't we rename the 'MIDI' tab to Music, plonk the
>  'AdLib emulator' option into it too, and then move the 'Volume'
>  tab into 'Audio' with the space left by removing two comboboxes,
>  at least on small-screen devices? Crazy? (I haven't tried it.)
>  But it would be less confusing to *me*, at least.
>
>  (Obviously if we could instead just have a single tab with the
>  audio device configuration that might be a much nicer way of doing
>  it, I just know that *I'm* not capable of making that work.)
>
> Comments/mockery/etc are welcome.
>
> - fuzzie
>
>
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