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[wuischke]

As already mentioned a couple of times, we aim to have a new look for aMule 2.2.0.

You know, coders are not artists (yes, I drew that rabbit in the attached skin myself), so we are looking for your help. C'mon, among all these Mac users there have to be a couple of artist.

People like Treviño, deloun and mischamajskij have already done good work on a new look and we are shipping some skins with the daily tarball, but there are still some things we would like to see improved.

Criteria/improvements:

• be multiplatform - look good on Windows, Mac, Gnome, KDE,...
• aMule icon must stay a rabbit
• Rating icons should not use weather forecast icons
• Toolbar icons should be intuitive as we have no text on Mac
• Use open/free icons

The easiest way to try out a new look for aMule is to create a skin. A skin is a simple zip file with png files inside - just download a existing one and modify it, zip the file again and put it in your aMule skin folder to test the look!

You'll find more about skins in the wiki: http://www.amule.org/wiki/index.php/Skins

P.S. I've attached my attempt at creating a skin - unfortunately not very multiplatform.

P.S.S. No, aMule 2.2.0 will not be delayed because of the new look. When the showstopper-bugs are fixed, we will release, the new look can wait - but I prefer it not to.

[brainnolo]

I'm using aMule on a Mac and toolbar icons have text here. Anyway I doubt any skin will fix the aMule usability problems, the interface needs to be completely redesigned, a little makeup won't do

[wuischke]

Hi brainnolo,

I agree. But a complete interface overhaul requires a lot of work whereas a new default skin can be implemented between breakfast and lunch while still improving the look of the application.

Well, actually that's not true. I'ld have to install 32bit compatibility libraries first or use OpenBSD's linux compatibility to be able to use wxDesigner again. I offered Robert Roebling to help with a 64bit binary, but he didn't answer me to date. A pity, he was a very nice contact.

I think you can expect a new interface (probably using another toolkit) in the next non-bugfix version after 2.2.0 and you are welcome to give us design ideas for a new UI.

kind regards

[brainnolo]

I will be glad to help. Although I'm no usability expert, it is the field of my studies so the matter interest me a lot

[Cimmo]

can you change the black on grey colors in the homepage? It has asked tons of times by a lot of people, but never happened.
Really it's difficult to read, use a lighter grey for example, I think it's easy and fast to change for an immediate eye relax.

I don't think to be OT because you are talking about usability, and this is usability also, so let's start from the home!

thanx

[westcubegeek]

Hello!
The icon themes in aMule CVS makes aMule much nicer

But i have a little proposition...
Because i don't know the english word for this thing, i indicated it in a screenshot:


It would be nice to change them to inline GTK equivalents...
These are rounded and i don't find them very smooth!

I hope you understeand!

[Kry]

I think you can expect a new interface (probably using another toolkit) in the next non-bugfix version after 2.2.0 and you are welcome to give us design ideas for a new UI.

I don't think so and would appreciate not giving such hopes to users.

[natsirt]

I think something really useful would be to have the correct file icon (for each file type) in front of every file of a list, so it would be much easier to find what we are looking for...
(something like in emule)

Even if the icon is not the one of the application witch is supposed to open the file (but that would be great !), I think that the different file types should be more clearly visible (for an "all types" research for exemple)

Good luck for the amule project...!
I'm hardly waiting for this version

thx

[apo758]

All icons should be changed with more polished ones, not only toolbar icons. Sometimes they remind me Windows 98. Tango icons are great.

For usability, the real problem is that it has to look good on every platform but that's impossible! Windows, MacOS X, Gnome, KDE, etc… they all have different UI guidelines. Now it's good only on Linux and maybe on Windows: on MacOS X it looks like a mess.

But…

1) I'm not a developer but is it really so difficult to set different actions for the close button on different OS? On MacOS the close button quit the application ONLY when it makes no sense to have the application opened but no window (iLife suite, for example), but when you have an application that you need to use often (like Safari or iWork suite) or that you need to leave open while you are doing other things (like all the other P2P apps) the close button should only close the window, not the application.

2) As said by natsirt, different icon for different files. At least for the most common shared files (movies, archives, etc…).

3) Toolbar customization: I don't use messages, importer and I have never understood why there's a button for the about window. I have set the auto connection so I don't need a button on the toolbar. It would be great to decide what icon is useful and what icon is not. Flexible spaces would also be great but it's secondary.

4) Integration: if I'm downloading a movie, I can see the preview with VLC. But I can't see any preview for other files.

5) File rename don't need to have a button that confirm the action. You change the name in the textfield and it's automatically saved when you close the information window.

6) I don't know if this is a request for the GUI or not, but it's frustrating to see that a file is corrupted/fake because someone is using HyperMule (it sets all the file comments to corrupted/fake). Is it possible to have a filter for the comments?

[lfroen]

3) Toolbar customization: I don't use messages, importer and I have never understood why there's a button for the about window. I have set the auto connection so I don't need a button on the toolbar. It would be great to decide what icon is useful and what icon is not. Flexible spaces would also be great but it's secondary.

Useless waste of time. I personally hate such programs (MS Office, hello). Toolbar should be nice-looking, and fit on the screen of 800x600 (think about portable device).

4) Integration: if I'm downloading a movie, I can see the preview with VLC. But I can't see any preview for other files.

And how exactly you expect to preview ZIP file, for example? Hint: you can not.

[apo758]

I don't know if it's ZIP or RAR, but one of these archives for sure can. If you have a partial download you can decompress it and see a part of the compressed files.
I don't understand the reason of your first sentence. Customization doesn't mean that the toolbar will look ugly and it doesn't  mean that it will be larger than 800x600. Ok, you hate programs that leave the freedom to choose what buttons you can have on toolbar, but someone can love them. You can leave the toolbar as is and others can change it, what's making it useless?

[phoenix]

4) Integration: if I'm downloading a movie, I can see the preview with VLC. But I can't see any preview for other files.

And how exactly you expect to preview ZIP file, for example? Hint: you can not.

At least looking at the zip directory would be already something interesting, and IIRC, the directory has a well known place, either the first or last part of the file. I have read around that it is possible to decompress part of the file, there is probably an application to do that on windows, though I cannot confirm that.

[brainnolo]

For usability, the real problem is that it has to look good on every platform but that's impossible! Windows, MacOS X, Gnome, KDE, etc… they all have different UI guidelines. Now it's good only on Linux and maybe on Windows: on MacOS X it looks like a mess.

This is not true. Right now the aMule interface is simply not good at all. The main problem is actually that it is not centered around anything. It is using the toolbar as a tab-switcher, where every tab has the same "weight", although the application should be centered around searching&downloading. There are too many useless options. A real interface redesign comes at a cost: reduced feature set, at least initially (main candidates imho are chat, messages and stats).

As far as preferences go, is there any reason for which I shouldn't want to automatically connect at startup, reconnect after connection is lost? Why should I want to disable one of the possible networks? Heck do I really need to know about UPnP? it is meant to be transparent! (if you *really* want to keep the option at least label it something like "Bypass Router/Firewalls") . Do we really need separate download/upload settings for stats and limiting? What is slot allocation? there is no help for that. Did anybody ever change ports or maximum file limits (and if you do, do you get any real advantage?). Here we could remove entire PANES of options, relabel a few more and stop cloning eMule. I really think I could go on forever, given the interface looks like it is designed to test features and not to be used.

If the developers are interested in changing the interface I can try to help, but again, it won't be painless at all at the begin. The benefits would be huge. The application won't "look good" on every system but it will at least be easier and more pleasant to learn and to use. wxWidgets are not a problem at all.

aMule is a great application written by great developers, I've had the chance to collaborate with phoenix on a little patch and he was great. But developers aren't the best interface designers

[apo758]

I agree with you, brainnolo, but I think that the problem is that every OS gives some habits. MacOS makes you want all integrated, all look very good and all look easier and cleaner (for the GUI). Linux makes you want al the possible options to tweak and other great things. Windows makes you want to format. This is just an example based on my experience.
Remove every not-so-simple panes… I don't think that it's the good chioce. It's the better choice for Mac users like me, IMHO, but not for the average Linux user.
The best would be drop wxWidgets and find an alternative way to draw the GUI, a more native and OS-different way, but I think it's impossible, right?
An option is to release a GTK version for Linx, for example, and a version for Mac based on amuled and a good, Mac-like, interface and make them work seamlessly as the classic aMule works. amuled and an official frontend. Is it possible? What would be the problems in it?
I think that a lot of Mac users would prefere this way and it would not affect Linux users because there would be no change for them.

However I especially agree with brainnolo on a thing: stop cloning eMule. aMule is powerful, for something it's a great application, but I think that it's strong and mature enough to take its road, to get some differences in usability.
aMule can conquer a large number of Window users but it have to be different from eMule.

[Kry]

Either you use gnome or MacOS. Either way, we like flexibility in the options we present to the user, and as much control over the features as possible. If you don't understand an option or won;t use it, fine by me, just don't use it. But don't prevent other people from ahving the possibility to use it just because you see no need for it. The whole "let's dumb down the interface as much as posisble and make assumptions about what people want" gnome-like mentality is, for me and for most people I know, wrong on so many levels.

Most, if not all, of the options you mention are not only used daily by most people, but some are essential to the program usage. Ignorance about how the program works is not an exuse to contest the existance of such options.

I'm always for finding better default values, but never for removing the possibility for the user to tweak the program at his/her will.