Talk:Toolbars Overview

Former ednote discussion
Peter 20Nov14: Following a recent post by Koz about providing context I decided to add an image of the full set of toolbars. Gale 26Nov14: Can you explain more what you want to do? Peter 26Nov14: what I'd ideally like is no permanent green boxes on the image bur rather when the cursor is hovered over one of the target rectangles in the imagemap the not only would you get the hovertext but also a temporary green rectangle drawn to the target rectangle boundary.Gale 27Nov14: Sounds like you would want different images for each toolbar with only that toolbar bordered, and a javascript function to call the required image when you hover. In any case that would make the problem of figuring which toolbar is which even worse for users who can't use a mouse. I honestly think you should be able to tell which is which just by loading the page.I also considered whether I would use finer-grained targets on the imagemap, as Bill does, targeting for example each button on the Transport Toolbar but decided against that. We could implement that later if though useful, but I don't think it's necessary here. The images of the top dock are all at default size in an Audacity window, but have been scaled to 91% of actual size in Microsoft Paint to fit with the 810 pixels with that Connie likes. Scaling like this in Paint produces a clearer image the a "pipe 810px" in the markup on the page here.  Steve 25Nov14: There's lots of ways that this "could" be done, and lots of pros and cons to balance. This looks good to me and I can certainly live with it as per "Strawman-6". <li>Gale 26Nov14: I can certainly live with it and mostly it has the best of all worlds. I do feel users who can't use a mouse are being somewhat disadvantaged in seeing which toolbar is which in this image. There is no strawman for Steve's arrowed text with this image. There are good precedents for that solution e.g. Device Toolbar. I agree a numbered list starting at 2 or disagreeing with the numbers on the magic image is not good. </ul></ul>
 * Peter 20Nov14: Once the front page imagemap has been updated I may consider cannibalizing it for the top tool-rack image.
 * Peter 25Nov14: After much consideration I have implemented Strawman-6 from my tests. This version has a simple imagemap for the top tool docking area, each toolbar in that dock image has a single link that drives the used to the detailed Toolbar page.  Additionally each toolbar image on the page is its own imagemap and clicking on it links the reader showing the reader a reference page showing each toolbar in context with a red box around it (as Koz originally proposed). See Toolbars red-boxed in context.  I decided in favor of the full-dock images rather that the reduced ones I tried in Strawman-4 because as this is a reference page linked to from this page the full context is not so repetitious and "in your face".  This page stays cleaner-looking this way too without any red-boxing on this page.  This page will also be useful to Koz (and other Forum elves) as each image has a divid anchor to link to it e.g. Mixer: anchor #mixer.  The other anchors are #transport,  #tools,  #recording,  #playback,  #mixer,  #edit, #transcription,  #device  and  #selection.  Originally I considered implementing a cut-down version of Bill's-amazing-imagemap from the front page but that proved very tricky to get right.  Furthermore I decided that I didn't want to clutter this page with the green numbers.  They are useful on the front page as it is a complex image, but here it looked a bit messy when I tried it, plus renumbering would be neceassry as otherwise I would be starting counting at "2" so if a remake is required I thought it better to start from scratch.  I also experimented with green boxes around the toolbars in the top dock image see Strawman-3 but I really didn't like that, it too looks messy imo.  I think what I'd really like to be able to do would be to have hover-texts that included the requisite green box, but I've no idea how to do that or even if it's possible.
 * Peter 28Nov14: There appears to be a unanimous vote appearing on the Forum for Bill's second image with the blue annotations - I certainly like it.
 * Peter 28Nov14: Gale Andrews wrote: "And I still think it's wrong to link down the page then have to click again if you want the details page for that toolbar."  Big +1 to that. I argued previously in this discussion that is fairly pointless using the topdock imagemap to shunt people down this page because the information on this page is (by design and of necessity) very sparse.  It makes much more sense to send them off to the detailed Toolbar pages.  Accordingly I have changed the links in the annotated imagemaps to go direct to the "Xxxx Toolbar" pages.
 * Peter 28Nov14:Also today I have "retired" the red-boxed in-context page.
 * I have made the imagemaps on the "Xxxx Toolbar" pages link back to the green boxed images in "Toolbars Overview"
 * I added an in-context green-boxed image of the bottom dock for the Selection Toolbar in context on the Toolbars Overview page
 * so now the hypertext linking is: "Toobars overview "<<==>> "Xxxx Toolbar" (Much simpler and less to maintain) And Koz (and other Forum elves) can then link to the anchors for the imagemaps on "Toolbars Overview" as the green boxing and annotations provide the context.

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