Thread: Re: About pgAdmin III

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Andreas Pflug [mailto:pgadmin@pse-consulting.de]
> Sent: 07 September 2003 22:31
> To: Dave Page
> Cc: pgadmin-hackers@postgresql.org
> Subject: Re: [pgadmin-hackers] About pgAdmin III
>
>
> Dave Page wrote:
>
> >I didn't realise the windows were resizable - dialogues generally
> >aren't. In fact looking at them, most of ours aren't. From a good
> >design point of view, this is a bad thing because we have dialogues
> >basically performing the same function (ie showing object
> properties),
> >that are designed in an inconsistent manner.
> >
> Oh Dave, what's the point?
> Most dialogs don't have content that makes resizing senseful, so why
> should they resize? To have plenty of white space?
> Stacking modal dialogs is much worse design, and actually
> dialog design
> *is* consistent regarding sizing: all dialogs resize in the ranges it
> makes sense, i.e. not bigger than necessary, and not smaller
> to prevent
> hiding of vital information.

What's the point? The point is that inconsistent design is *bad* design.
Saying that they are consistent because they are all sized to fit their
purpose kinda stretches the meaning of the word don't you think? This is
a classic example, because 90% of our dialogues are not resizable, I
didn't realise that 2 of them were - how are users that are less
familiar with pgAdmin going to figure that out?

I don't necessarily want to make them all resizable, I would however
like to see them all the same initial/permanent size and shape, and all
having the same basic design. I would also like a nice way of editting
functions/views of *any* size - whether through a popup editor (which
can be done well without making it modal), or through some other method.

> >Perhaps in the next version we should consider a different
> layout for
> >the dialogues - something that lends itself to resizing more that we
> >can use across the board, and something that is more
> visually appealing
> >(that's a criticism I've heard a couple of times in the
> past) as well
> >as functional.
> >
> How "more visually appealing", more colors, fancy bitmaps? Can't
> remember fundamental criticism about this, please state the details.

We have been criticised in the past with pgAdmin II that it doesn't look
nice. As you know, pgAdmin II has more graphics etc. in it (in combo
boxes and so on) than pgAdmin III which is otherwise basically the same
design, therefore it stands to reason that the same complaint applies to
pgAdmin III. This is v.low priority of course.

> Especially when talking about functions, there are really other items
> preventing fast development than shape and smell of a dialog, I'm
> talking about the poor debugging (i.e. non-existent) debugging
> facilities for plpgsql. I'm thinking about intelligent
> support for that
> (not in a modal dialog of course)

plpgsql debugging would be a really good feature.

Regards, Dave.

Dave Page wrote:

>having the same basic design. I would also like a nice way of editting
>functions/views of *any* size -
>
There's no intrinsic size limit, it's a question of development cycle.
For views and functions, you have a classic edit/compile/debug cycle,
which isn' supported by the property dialogs (and IMHO is beyond their
scope).

>whether through a popup editor (which
>can be done well without making it modal),
>
No, must be modal to prevent users to mess around with the parent of the
popup window (e.g. closing it, or changing the language)

>or through some other method.
>
Magic? :-)

>
>
>We have been criticised in the past with pgAdmin II that it doesn't look
>nice. As you know, pgAdmin II has more graphics etc. in it (in combo
>boxes and so on) than pgAdmin III which is otherwise basically the same
>design, therefore it stands to reason that the same complaint applies to
>pgAdmin III. This is v.low priority of course.
>
I don't know these criticisms in detail, but I find some pgadmin2
dialogs ugly too (which originates mostly from the VB controls). IMHO,
the appearance of pgAdmin3 is good, except for the main toolbar which is
too big (and instead of fixing wxWindow's separators size I'd rather
like the bitmaps in 16x16).

Regards,
Andreas