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Author Topic: Customize Current View  (Read 1430 times)

park

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Customize Current View
« on: March 21, 2006, 12:45:22 am »

I'd just like to comment on the new way that tiles can be customized in "customize current view". Hope some people agree with me.

1.
I like the direction this is going in. I even think that this could be one ultimate view options page in the not too distant future. Now, the "columns" customization seems redundant to me. This could be remade to choose the "columns"(panes) that are seen in panes view, thus replacing the need for the "edit viewscheme", and by extension (through the presets) completely negating the need to make different viewschemes in the tree at all.

2.
Now "customize current view" actually points to two different places (customization for the top tiles view, and the bottom list/thumbnails view), but there is nothing on the interface to give any hint of that. I'm sure that a new user would be completely baffled to see a different options window and wouldnt quickly make the connection that it's because they either have have a tile, or file in the bottom list selected.
My preference would be to split the cutomize current view window in two (vertically split in half, or two tabs, or something like the way you can customize the top and bottom toolbars from the same place right now).

3.
Many of the time/click saving behaviours that i loved have slowly being taken out of the software over the last couple of months. (One was the intelligent way that MC remembered selections after clearing searches, switching between tiles/panes views, and selecting on list entries in the panes. This made tagging, and train of thought style browsing really easy. But that's another story and already been discussed.) The way MC remembered the sorting for tiles at each level independantly, was an amazing time saver. The fact is that I more often than not, want to see my genres sorted alphabetically, and my artists sorted by "last played". When I want to see my artists alphabetically I could change them quickly and easily in the "Options" drop down. But now, since i usually start my browsing from genre, I have to change my "artists" sorting almost everytime I enter that level.

My suggestion is to have every view remember its last sorting (stop "sorting" in customize current view from having any effect over that view, and use instead as a place to just set up the "Sorting presets" list that is found on the main "options" drop down menu, that the user might want to configure).
Let MC "learn" how the user wants to see everything by remembering the last view.

4.
As I said at the beginning, this could be a one stop place to set up everything related to the view, given that there would be customizable "presets" for the panes setup, the tiles/bottom list sorting, and the columns to be shown in the bottom list view.  We could completely forget about having different sub-viewschemes (or any viewschemes in the tree at all since we have the media buttons next to the search bar), and just have "Audio" "Images" and "Video".

However, to accomodate this, these "presets" would have to be put onto the main interface (in the "Options" drop down menu) so that people dont have to "customize current view" (and multiple click their way through options just to accomplish simple view changing).

I would make 4 submenus in the options drop down menu containing a list of the following user defined presets set up in customize current view:
i.Choosing the panes(hence library view groupings list)
ii. Sorting of Tiles
iii. Sorting of Bottom list view
iv. Columns to show in bottom list view

In essence "Customize current view" would do what it should do: set up the view, while the shortcut presets in the drop down menu would be for switching views, and sorting etc. There would be no more set in stone "views" or "viewschemes" or "sorting per viewscheme" anymore. Media Center would be truly liquid.


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datdude

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Re: Customize Current View
« Reply #1 on: March 21, 2006, 12:59:08 am »

3.
Many of the time/click saving behaviours that i loved have slowly being taken out of the software over the last couple of months. (One was the intelligent way that MC remembered selections after clearing searches, switching between tiles/panes views, and selecting on list entries in the panes. This made tagging, and train of thought style browsing really easy. But that's another story and already been discussed.) The way MC remembered the sorting for tiles at each level independently, was an amazing time saver. The fact is that I more often than not, want to see my genres sorted alphabetically, and my artists sorted by "last played". When I want to see my artists alphabetically I could change them quickly and easily in the "Options" drop down. But now, since i usually start my browsing from genre, I have to change my "artists" sorting almost every-time I enter that level.

Man, I have been pushing for some type of saved/favorite searches for a while.  How did MC used to remember past searches?

I think the more customizable each view is the better.  One feature I want added is the files at bottom to be up or down based upon each view
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"You are not a beautiful or unique snowflake." -  Just a very big snowball

park

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Re: Customize Current View
« Reply #2 on: March 21, 2006, 01:59:07 am »

It didnt remember past searches, but it remembered which files I had selected and kept them selected even after i cleared the search bar.

Getting back to Customize Current View: Rather than two lists "A-Z" and "Z-A", I'd like it if there there were instead a toggle box/button called "Reverse", so that i could quickly select all the fields i want to sort by, and then control select all the ones that i want to reverse and do it in one swoop.
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dcwebman

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Re: Customize Current View
« Reply #3 on: March 21, 2006, 07:22:52 am »

2.
Now "customize current view" actually points to two different places (customization for the top tiles view, and the bottom list/thumbnails view), but there is nothing on the interface to give any hint of that. I'm sure that a new user would be completely baffled to see a different options window and wouldnt quickly make the connection that it's because they either have have a tile, or file in the bottom list selected.
My preference would be to split the cutomize current view window in two (vertically split in half, or two tabs, or something like the way you can customize the top and bottom toolbars from the same place right now).
If I understand what you're saying correctly, the Customize Current View under the Options drop down controls just the top thumbnails. If you want to customize the view of the details at the bottom, you need to right click on that and choose Customize Current View. Even though Columns To Show is displayed for the top thumbnails it doesn't apply to the bottom which I can see because I have an extra column at the bottom which isn't shown in the list for the top view. Now if I misunderstood, sorry.
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Jeff
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