[opensource-dev] Review viewer -- draw distance slider

[Ricky]

Thus far I'm in favor of the eye icon. Lately I've been using the
Unreal Developers Kit a lot for classwork, and there is even a 8x8 or
so eye icon that is still legible, though most of the eye icons are
larger.  None have lashes, just the arcs and iris dot.

Once the icon is set, people will get used to it fast.  The issue here
is that there is no "standard" (de facto or otherwise) for an icon
that represents draw distance.  I can't even find a program that has
an icon for the draw distance setting: most either have the setting
hidden in a config menu or, as in Blender, in a sidebar with a textual
heading.

We just don't want to try to redefine an icon that has an existent
strong meaning.  Camera iris is used for brightness, scaled trees (and
magnifying glass) for zoom, magnifying glass and binoculars for
search.  The eye though has no strong meaning in my mind.  UDK uses
the eye for "lock selected actor to the camera" - not exactly an
intuitive use, but they rolled with it.

Ricky
Cron Stardust

On Sun, Jun 12, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Trilo Byte <trilobyte550m at gmail.com> wrote:
> Agreed regarding the magnifying glass icon - it's used both in SL and in some browsers as an icon representing Search.
>
> The problem with using a 1 tree/many trees approach is that a) that's already used to denote zoom, not viewing distance, and b) that type of display works best when it's on either side of the control in question (either side of  the zoom rocker on a digital camera, for example.
>
> I like the binoculars icon idea, but agree that it could cause confusion since other applications commonly use the symbol for search.
>
> An eye icon has merit, since it controls how much the user sees.  Given the 16x16 pixel constraint, I think the rays/lines coming off the eye would be less clear, and may cause some possible confusion with the speaker/volume icon (which is exactly what you want to avoid).  Speaker icon for what you hear, eye for what you see, seems pretty straightforward, and a tooltip when moused over/used would further eliminate confusion.
>
> As for the notice to pop up when the setting gets raised too high, how about using "caution" in place of "warning". - subtle change in language makes the message read more like helpful guidance.
>
> On Jun 11, 2011, at 4:08 PM, Jonathan Welch wrote:
>
>> While testing the updated graphic I've been looking at the cautionary
>> wording on the slider and am not happy with it.  There is no good way
>> to align the text so it looks nice in all languages and the width of
>> the slider would have to be wide enough to support the longest word in
>> whatever language that happens to be.
>>
>> I am thinking that a warning notification message could be sent if the
>> draw distance is adjusted up past a certain threshold.  Much more
>> explanatory text could be put into this notice and it would also be
>> i10n friendly.
>>
>> Warning: You have just set your draw distance to a large value.  This
>> may cause poor system response.
>> _______________________________________________
>> Policies and (un)subscribe information available here:
>> http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/OpenSource-Dev
>> Please read the policies before posting to keep unmoderated posting privileges
>
> _______________________________________________
> Policies and (un)subscribe information available here:
> http://wiki.secondlife.com/wiki/OpenSource-Dev
> Please read the policies before posting to keep unmoderated posting privileges
>