Anyone who is currently using the (still beta) version of Carousel, could you please answer the following question?
Right now, you need to do two levels of grouping in order to create a Carousel element on the page. First, you group the individual panes, then apply an Action to that group. Next you create any controls you want (buttons or tabs) and then group those together with the Carousel.
I am thinking about changing this quite a bit. What I am imagining is that you would draw a layered HTML box wherever you wanted the Carousel to live. Then you would apply the Carousel action to that box. All the rest of the effect would then be drawn as child elements to that box. So you would draw your first pane, set it up, and apply a “marker” action to it (which would just tell the main Carousel action that “this is a pane”. Then you could step and repeat that pane to create the other panes, without needing to group anything. Finally, any controls that you drew as children of the main Carousel layer would become part of that Carousel.
In this new scheme there wouldn’t be any need to group anything, but you would need to keep aware of the parent-child relationships, just as you currently do when designing individual panes.
One additional benefit to this would be that you could move elements out of one Carousel and into another without “breaking” the group. Currently, if you want to modify a set of panes, you have to ungroup them, and then you have to re-group them and re-apply the Carousel action. (Plus, you lose whatever settings you applied the first time.)
Any comments on this as a change to the way you work with the Action? Does it strike you as less or more confusing than the current method?
In this new scheme there wouldn’t be any need to group anything, but you would need to keep aware of the parent-child relationships, just as you currently do when designing individual panes.
Any comments on this as a change to the way you work with the Action? Does it strike you as less or more confusing than the current method?
sounds good to me Walter, I think the logic is good and it looks like you will have done all the tricky bit - especially for beginners !
Having grappled with the action yesterday (successfully) this does
sound like it will simplify construction. I did trip up a couple of
times but got there in the end. I think the number of elements and
keeping track of them is the key as you imply and I found the Page
elements pane invaluable for getting it right. In that respect it may
be six of one and half a dozen of the other.
Not at all a personal criticism here Walt, but I find that, at least
the first time, it is the quality of accompanying instructions that
make the difference between easy and tricky to use for any unfamiliar
process. The default instructions should assume complete idiocy in
most cases ie every step outlined, even if they seem blindingly
obvious to the creator of the new process/action/technique.
Cheers
Pete
On 12 Feb 2008, at 15:44, waltd wrote:
Anyone who is currently using the (still beta) version of Carousel,
could you please answer the following question?
Right now, you need to do two levels of grouping in order to create
a Carousel element on the page. First, you group the individual
panes, then apply an Action to that group. Next you create any
controls you want (buttons or tabs) and then group those together
with the Carousel.
I am thinking about changing this quite a bit. What I am imagining
is that you would draw a layered HTML box wherever you wanted the
Carousel to live. Then you would apply the Carousel action to that
box. All the rest of the effect would then be drawn as child
elements to that box. So you would draw your first pane, set it up,
and apply a “marker” action to it (which would just tell the main
Carousel action that “this is a pane”. Then you could step and
repeat that pane to create the other panes, without needing to
group anything. Finally, any controls that you drew as children of
the main Carousel layer would become part of that Carousel.
In this new scheme there wouldn’t be any need to group anything,
but you would need to keep aware of the parent-child relationships,
just as you currently do when designing individual panes.
One additional benefit to this would be that you could move
elements out of one Carousel and into another without “breaking”
the group. Currently, if you want to modify a set of panes, you
have to ungroup them, and then you have to re-group them and re-
apply the Carousel action. (Plus, you lose whatever settings you
applied the first time.)
Any comments on this as a change to the way you work with the
Action? Does it strike you as less or more confusing than the
current method?
My main concern is being able to put actions within the Carousel. I’d like to be able to do some effects on the various panes, that won’t break the script. I know you were working on it, but that would be the really cool thing. Setting it up is a little confusing unless you’ve done it quite a bit… I did this test site, to get it and some other actions going… Trying to some of the new stuff…
This does sound like a step forward especially when editing later.
On 12 Feb 2008, at 15:44, waltd wrote:
One additional benefit to this would be that you could move elements out of one Carousel and into another without “breaking” the group. Currently, if you want to modify a set of panes, you have to ungroup them, and then you have to re-group them and re-apply the Carousel action. (Plus, you lose whatever settings you applied the first time.)
David Owen
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