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#Blueprint Menus ¶

Hello, ¶
this is a proposal for reworking the menu windows for wares, workers and buildings. Some proposals and discussion have already been made in the [forum](http://wl.widelands.org/forum/topic/490/) and the [wiki](http://wl.widelands.org/wiki/UsabilityWareSorting/). I want to turn the discussion more concrete (lists for all tribes, specific aspects of the different windows concerned) and complete (illustration, trading). ¶

The menus for wares, workers and buildings are present in the following menus: ¶

* Wares: headquarter / warehouse / stock menu, ware statistics, in-game ware help, economy options, construction site box (some wares) ¶
* Workers: headquarter / warehouse / stock menu, probably in future: in-game help (like the ware help) ¶
* Buildings: action box (when choosing which building to be built), building statistics (here also the military buildings of other tribes are shown), probably in future: in-game help ¶

There are three big things to think of: First, the sorting of the items in meaningful categories. Second, the illustration in the game which should make these categories understandable, make the items quickly findable, but should not make the windows too big. And third, the implementing of the sorting. ¶

##1. Categories ¶
###Wares + workers ¶
I suggest 6 thematical categories: transport, construction, food, resources, tools, war. ¶
The items included in these categories for the different tribes are shown in the [pdf Sorting wares and workers](http://www.widelands.org/~sirver/wl/blueprint_menus/sorting_wares_workers.pdf). ¶

The categories itself are in order of „appearance“ when playing widelands. The items are arranged from simple to complex, e.g. wheat before bread before ration. ¶

There are some wares which could be sorted in two categories, e.g. barbarians axe (tool, war) or empire marble (construction, resources). I tried different categories, but found no single one to match perfectly. If somebody finds one....? I suggest to show these wares in one of the categories only. We will accustom ourselves to where the ware is shown like we did with the present completly irregular menus. ¶

**Alternative solutions** ¶
There was the question to eventually show wares together with the according workers or buildings. In my opinion, two different tabs for wares and workers are indispensable. It is not feasible to arrange all workers with their wares (and buildings) without making it confusing because: ¶
1.There are so much overlaps e.g. empire wheat is a product of the farmer/farm and a precursor for the baker/bakery + brewer/brewery + pig breeder/piggery + donkey breeder/donkeyfarm + shepherd/sheepfarm. So the ware wheat would appear in 6 places, what would make the menu confusing and huge! ¶
2. There are too much different things which should be shown together: worker + building + tool + precursor ware + product. This would make it more difficult to quickly check the quantitiy of wares (e.g. how much trunk is in the headquarter) and it would also make the menu very large. ¶
? So for showing the connection between the wares, workers and buildings, I suggest a presentation as a network, like in Sirver's [barbarians pdf](http://wl.widelands.org/wlmedia/news/uploaded/Barbarians.pdf). This is something to show on the homepage on the tribe‘s side or in future in the in-game help. ¶

There also was the proposal to list the items in alphabetical order. I do not prefer this, because I find the thematical order more intuitive. For example, while playing, I want to know if I did all to push my construction sector. So I look in the construction category, no matter if the men who provide us with trunks are called lumberjack and ranger or woodcutter and forester. ¶

###Buildings ¶
As in the action box we have to sort the buildings according to their size (small, medium, big building, mine), I suggest to do this also in the other boxes (present: building statistics, in future: in-game help). As second classification, I suggest the same thematical order as proposed for wares and workers. ¶
This gets the order shown in the [pdf Sorting buildings](http://www.widelands.org/~sirver/wl/blueprint_menus/sorting_buildings.pdf). ¶

A particularity of the buildings statistic is the listing of other tribe‘s military buildings that the player has captured. I suggest to list them in the big categories (small, medium, big, mine) after the military buildings of the own tribe. ¶
Other possibilites are to make a new tab with foreign buildings (only captured buildings from a foreign tribe can be shown, not from a other player who plays the same tribe) or with „special“ buildings (foreign captured buildings and headquarter). ¶
In all cases, it is not meaningful to show foreign military buildings from a tribe which is not in the game, as it is the case currently. ¶

Furthermore, in the building statistics, we have to list the enhanced buildings. I suggest to list them directly after the unenhanced they once were. ¶


##2. Illustration ¶
###Wares + workers ¶
**Headquarter / warehouse / stock menu** ¶
To use the present cute icons, I suggest to just reassort them in the box. In the headquarter / warehouse / stock menu, there are presently 5 columns with 8 items each. I propose to fill the 6 categories in the 5 columns, with the first two categories (transport, construction) in the first column, because they have very few items. To make the columns clear, it would be useful to make strong vertical lines between them, perhaps even a header. ¶
Another possibility (to save place) is to list the items in order of the categories one after another in lines, regardless the columns. This makes the window as small as possible, but for each tribe, the wares and workers have another place and the according wares and workers do not always appear in the same position of the menu. I judge this con bigger than the advantage of saving some place. ¶
This is an example for the wares and workers menu (here Barbarians wares) sorted by categories, where you can see the arrangement in columns and the place it takes: ¶

![stock_example.png](/wlmedia//wlimages/Stock_example.png) ¶

**Economy options window** ¶
The economy options window is currently a list in a much too big window (esp. too big in low resolutions). To make it smaller, we could design it similar to the stock menu. ¶
You see a mock-up in the following. In this example, the permanent target quantity (here always 8) should be adjusted by clicking on a ware. Ctrl+click adjusts the temporary target quantity which is shown in brackets (here always 15). The reset button is the icon with the round symbole (to avoid long words when translated) right at the bottom. It resets ALL wares to a default (temporary = permanent) target quantity. ¶
(Headquarter menu shown to compare size): ¶
![bild_hq_eo_im_vergleich2.png](/wlmedia//wlimages/Bild_HQ_eo_im_Vergleich2.png) ¶


###Buildings ¶
For the buildings menus (action box and building statistics) we need two different illustrations, because of the different buildings shown (enhanced or foreign captured buildings) and the much more information shown in for each building in the building statistics. ¶

**Action box** ¶
For the action box, I suggest to let the present boxes and their tabs and just reassort the order of the buildings according to the six thematical categories. This is because a sorting in small, medium and big buildings is necessary and additional sorting according the thematical categories would make the box very large. ¶

**Building statistics** ¶
For the buildings statistics, I propose to make 4 tabs: small, medium, big buildings and mines. In these categories, I prefer to let the present list, because it provides enough place to show the information for each building (how many of the building type the player owns and how good their productivity is). I would rearrange the items in the list according to the thematical categories. ¶
The enhanced buildings could be shown indented after the original building to make it clear where they come from. ¶

###Trading ¶
Another point to think of when changing the menus is the illustration of traded wares, because trading is one of the future projects. The traded wares may be the same as the ones from the own tribe (e.g. trunk) or others (e.g. gold yarn), which normally this tribe doesn‘t own but trades between two other players. Because the own wares cannot be seperated in original own and traded wares, I suggest to make a new tab in the ware statistics which shows the traded wares and the player with whom one is trading. ¶
In the headquarter / warehouse / stock menu, I‘d add also the traded wares in a new tab, but here only the new wares (from a foreign tribe) because the others (e.g. trunk) are put together with the original own wares in the first tab. ¶

##3. Implementing ¶
As the categories are a well defined set that matches all of the current tribes, it seems reasonable to hard code them into widelands. The mechanism to define the sorting inside the menus is yet to be determined. A simple and probably sane approach is to add to each conf file for each worker, ware and building of a tribe two new global option: category (a string value) and ordering_rank (a unsigned integer). After all loading is done, the internal array of description can than be ordered by categories and inside the categories by order rank. The current save game format would likely not need to be changed. ¶

##Conclusion ¶
In the [forum](http://wl.widelands.org/forum/topic/490/) we discussed some details of the building statistics and the economy options window. The sorting in categories proposed in this blueprint have not been discussed, so I assume that they are widely accepted. ¶
The aim of this blueprint is to have a documented example of how some of the experienced players and developers would like the new menus. So a developer who can feel the itch in his fingers to rework the menus can directly start. And I hope that this developer exists... :-) ¶
Greetings, ¶
Kristin


##Progress ¶
* I (nomeata) started to work on this. The ordering code for the regular hq menu now takes information from the tribes config. Can someone fill the conf with the wares and workers in the desired order? https://code.launchpad.net/~nomeata/widelands/wares-positioning