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Offline ZorroTopic starter

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #14 on: June 10, 2003, 07:58:26 PM »
@ zudobug

Quote
That tells you something about how much I care about the look of it. I tend to agree that functionality is what I'm after. GUI effects like transparency are nice, but I'll spend most of my time browsing the web or coding. Focusing on what I'm doing rather than how I'm doing it.


I am not a GUI candy lover but if you can smooth the fonts and some gadgets, why can't you complete the job with all other elements of the GUI ?

At least to reach a omogeneus look... this is my point.

Anyway all of us take functionality at first place... or we had left the amiga world many years ago...  :-)

Alpha channel, save us all !!!

 ;-)
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Offline mikeymike

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #15 on: June 10, 2003, 08:12:27 PM »
Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...

... but we'd like a little path running down the middle.

A path! A path!

I like the laurels particularly.

 

Offline iamaboringperson

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #16 on: June 10, 2003, 11:47:20 PM »
i hate the screenshots

too gimmicky, like windows XP, if you know what i mean

if it were a bit more serious and professional, i would like it more


they should provide a version of intuition.library and boopsi gadgets for people who only want a simple UI - for speed
i could copy these simpler libraries over and then all the customization crap would be disabled but it would be faster overall
 

Offline Darth_X

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #17 on: June 11, 2003, 12:24:11 AM »
Which city is worlds most livable?

I know vancouver, Canada,  is one of the most livable places :-D
 

Offline iamaboringperson

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #18 on: June 11, 2003, 12:28:57 AM »
Quote

Darth_X wrote:
Which city is worlds most livable?

I know vancouver, Canada,  is one of the most livable places :-D
Melbourne! and thats official! :-D

it has been voted the best by some magazine(several times) and a number of other people :-D
 

Offline gnarly

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #19 on: June 11, 2003, 12:29:30 AM »
@iamaboringperson

Dont want the gradients? Turn them off. Dont want the font smoothing? Turn it off. See a patern emerging here? :-)
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Offline iamaboringperson

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #20 on: June 11, 2003, 12:35:03 AM »
Quote

gnarly wrote:
@iamaboringperson

Dont want the gradients? Turn them off. Dont want the font smoothing? Turn it off. See a patern emerging here? :-)


im completly aware of that ;-)

but there is still a fair bit of program code to go through for those options - i may be a bit picky, but it would be nice to have the option of alternative faster libraries

i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen ;-)
 

Offline jeffimix

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #21 on: June 11, 2003, 12:51:22 AM »
Zudobug! OS1.3 doesn't look That bad, I mean hey, blue and orange, what could be better, and Whiteborders! Oo-la-la 4 colors here!
\\"The only benchmarks that matter is my impression of the system while using the apps I use. Everything else is opinion.\\" - FooGoo
 

Offline Rodney

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #22 on: June 11, 2003, 05:57:34 AM »
Quote

Zorro wrote:
I like the new os4 screenshots...

the grey and metal brushed look is ok, the font engine is almost perfect, almost all the gadgets are good and the gradients are very nice.

But... you should expect it ! :-) A little lovely question ! :-D :-D

I would know if the icons, the gadgets and the other elements that aren't anti-aliased in the shots will be
smoothed so to reach a real consistent overall look ?

Hyperion ? Graphic designers ? Anyone ?

@ all

What do you like or not like from the actual shots ?


Alessandro


Well, id say things shouldnt have to be anti-aliased, they should just be that way when they are created. Ie icons should be created smooth, and any other things also. I dont think you should degrade system performance just to make things a little prettier, when if they were creted prettier in the first place, you wouldnt have to worry about it.

Same for gadgets, they can be cretaed to look smooth from the word go. So can round windows, just use round smooth graphix... etc...

The reason we have it for text is that, its hard to do it for text i'd thing. You have to have each character as a vector image, but vector images have only been big the last couple of years. Infact, i dont know if we even had them pre 95?

Oh, that brings another thing to mind. Does AmigaOS have support for vector graphix? Cause vectorised icons would be sweet, as well as gadgets and windows.. that way you could resize everything, but nothing woudl come out blocky :) andyway, thats another discussion...

I think anti-alisasing should be kept to text. Its up to gadget creators and icon created to creat smooth graphix, not an anti-aliassing engine to tidy up their own work.
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Offline SnowBord

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #23 on: June 11, 2003, 07:24:50 AM »
AFAIK all the system gadgets are vector images.  get some gui creation tool and have fun drawing HUUUUGE checkboxes or any other GUI attribute if you don't believe me.

Amiga E i think had one, so do many other tools.
so vectors ARE PART of the AmigaOS GUI system, probably since it's conception.. if not then definately since 2.0.

and erm no. you can't anti-alias all the icons 'when they are created' if you want a decent looking icon... they would anti-alias relative to the background.. so if the icon artist anti-aliased them for a white background and you are using say a dark blue one, it wouldn't look right would it?  it would have a gray or whiteish border.

vectors have been around since the dawn of time... probably.  they weren't 'discovered' in 95.  i forget the name now, but i have used many a vector drawing package.  Wordworth for christ sake had vector support.  i wouldn't be surprised if there's some datatype on aminet.

and what are you on about vectors only big in the past few years, especially fonts???!?!  what about TrueType, IntelliFont, etc. etc.
Workbench 3.0 had it.  So did Windows 95 or 3.1 or just about anything in circulation since the early 90s.
Again, it wasn't conceived then.. that's when it came into mainstream use!

and while we're after top performance, why not stick it on 4 colour orange and blue ala 1.3 or just use the CLI.
any modern computer (AmigaOne included) won't even blink an eyelid if we had to anti-alias everything.
GFX card accelaration would probably do it all anyway.  And considering you can run Quake 3 at something like 150FPS with all the extras, do you think some anti-aliased text or icons are really going to make your system unresponsive???
 

Offline Waccoon

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #24 on: June 11, 2003, 08:49:20 AM »
Quote
Iamaboringperson:  i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen

Ah, a practical GUI designer!  I respect that.  Unfortunately, we are a dying breed.  Try using THIS mess of a GUI:

TDK Mediacenter

Tiny fonts, bland colors, oddly shaped and placed buttons...  essentially, every mistake in the book!  If this is the future of GUI design, I will soon be critically ill.  Of course, this kind of tripe gets good reviews by the eye-candy geeks.

Personally, I don't care how a GUI looks so long as all the buttons are in the right place, and everything is clearly labeled.  I've never liked the soft, dark look of the OS4 preliminary screenshots.  I think they're a mess and poorly organized.  A good GUI makes a very good impression of the technology underneath.  Pretty backdrops and shadow effects do not.
 

Offline Rodney

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #25 on: June 11, 2003, 08:57:21 AM »
I add to myself and say, consistancy is something thats up to the user (appart from the one standard theme). The use much choose what icons, gadgets, pens and whatever else to use to get a consitant look.

Ohh, andi dont think that text compared to icons compared to gadgets has anythign to do with consistancy :)
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Offline xeron

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #26 on: June 11, 2003, 09:55:48 AM »
Quote

SnowBord wrote:
and erm no. you can't anti-alias all the icons 'when they are created' if you want a decent looking icon...


You can if the icon system supports an alpha channel.

Quote

they would anti-alias relative to the background.. so if the icon artist anti-aliased them for a white background and you are using say a dark blue one, it wouldn't look right would it?


Thats why you need an alpha channel; instead of anti-aliasing to a specific background, you specify levels of transparency. This is the only way to properly anti-alias bitmap images, since algorythmically antialiasing bitmap images just tends to "blur" the image, instead of making it appear clearer.
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Offline cycloid

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #27 on: June 11, 2003, 11:37:32 AM »
hmm, looks a bit like a Mac OS X and Win XP bastard love child...

so long as borders around windows and gadgets arent hardcoded to be OFF or "3D effect" as i like my single color ones in visualprefs (essentially make highlight and shadow color the same) :-)

and i LURVE being able to draw my own gadget bitmaps too!


but what i REALLY want to know is: have the icons been upgraded to have multiple icon sizes in one icon file so that one day we can view files just like in windows's "detail" view with a mini icon next to the filename!? yummy! and a MUST for doing serious computing (when big chunky icons just get in the way!
 

Offline SnowBord

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #28 on: June 11, 2003, 02:22:42 PM »
so an alpha channel won't take up computational power at all, will it?
they'll just make themselves transparent.

it's a different approach, that's all.  an alpha channel means more storage space per icon.  a different overhead.
granted though, it IS a way to go, but just an option.

if you would like partial transparency, then great, use alpha transparency.  if that's not an issue, i'd say it's a waste of storage space considering processing still has to be done.
and besides, anti-aliasing would only 'blur' the edges, not the whole image, which is hardly a problem.  a semi-transparent edge will lose some of the icon's definbition, and 'blur' within the image, not outside it.

so alpha channel's purpose is transparency, not smoothing icon borders.  otherwise, the icon is 'eaten away'.
 

Offline iamaboringperson

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Re: I like the new os4 screenshots but...
« Reply #29 from previous page: June 11, 2003, 11:16:52 PM »
Quote

Waccoon wrote:
Quote
Iamaboringperson:  i want my GUI software to draw lines, accept input, and splatter text all over the screen

Ah, a practical GUI designer!  I respect that.  Unfortunately, we are a dying breed.  Try using THIS mess of a GUI:

TDK Mediacenter

Tiny fonts, bland colors, oddly shaped and placed buttons...  essentially, every mistake in the book!  If this is the future of GUI design, I will soon be critically ill.  Of course, this kind of tripe gets good reviews by the eye-candy geeks.

Personally, I don't care how a GUI looks so long as all the buttons are in the right place, and everything is clearly labeled.  I've never liked the soft, dark look of the OS4 preliminary screenshots.  I think they're a mess and poorly organized.  A good GUI makes a very good impression of the technology underneath.  Pretty backdrops and shadow effects do not.


 :-o  eeeck! buy a brand new super dooper fast computer, only to have it slowed waay down with this nonsense