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Main Area and Open Discussion => General Software Discussion => Topic started by: zridling on January 17, 2011, 07:58 AM
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Web Upd8 (http://www.webupd8.org/) has the latest LibreOffice UI mockups (http://www.webupd8.org/2011/01/libreoffice-user-interface-mockups-with.html), inspired by the Blender UI (http://lh3.ggpht.com/_1QSDkzYY2vc/TEh0OMjuBTI/AAAAAAAABjA/v1ugkEG4IFI/blender-2.53.png). These shots are closer to the Lotus Symphony (http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/home.nsf/home) UI than Blender. Oh well, at least they're taking advantage of widescreens rather than reducing vertical space.
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ] (http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273)
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ] (http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273)
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ] (http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273)
Same as the first, only dark.
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For those unfamiliar, LibreOffice (http://www.libreoffice.org/) is the fork of OpenOffice after Oracle acquired Sun.
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they're taking advantage of widescreens rather than reducing vertical space.
-zridling
well, that sounds good. Using Word with the ribbon on a laptop is a PIA.
Would you recommend Libre these days Zaine? or Lotus, or ?
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Looks good UI to me, but why people are abandoning old MS office 2003 style interface ? :-\ That's very good UI IMO. I prefer more text options than icons.
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It has been noted that the 2010 office editions are moving back to sidebars and less clutter on the ribbon. I use OneNote 2010 here and the file tab is a sign of things to come, I think.
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Every time I am looking on new interface proposals I think about this:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/jensenh/archive/2008/03/12/the-story-of-the-ribbon.aspx
I know that wide screen LCDs are now trendy but do we really want to go back to:
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]
BTW Microsoft has already tried "side panel approach":
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]
BTW 2 I am always mad to see f*g font ComboBox being so narrow. Every office suite in the world has this issue. Wouldn't it be better to have it wider (allow to resize)? With font preview, perhaps?
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well, that sounds good. Using Word with the ribbon on a laptop is a PIA. Would you recommend Libre these days Zaine? or Lotus, or ?-tomos
I'm a text editor guy 95% of the time, however, I've been using the RC versions of LibreOffice for a couple of months and they're fine, in some ways notably better than OpenOffice because they clean up Options and Custom dialogs. Trust me, it's a welcome update.
Looks good UI to me, but why people are abandoning old MS office 2003 style interface ? :-\ That's very good UI IMO. I prefer more text options than icons. -mahesh2k
In part because screens have changed since the 90s. MSOffice 2003 is still being used by zillions around the globe (for good reason). With netbooks, more laptops, and 27" widescreen monitors that now cost $350 (http://www.benq.us/products/product_detail.cfm?product=1377), you've got room to reconsider the UI.
It has been noted that the 2010 office editions are moving back to sidebars and less clutter on the ribbon. I use OneNote 2010 here and the file tab is a sign of things to come, I think.-timns
I always thought OneNote was Microsoft's greatest software achievement. Seriously, it is incredible. Again, the Lotus Symphony office suite uses tabs throughout its UI.
I know that wide screen LCDs are now trendy but do we really want to go back to: <toolbar hell>-fenixproductions
No. Been there, done that.
BTW 2 I am always mad to see f*g font ComboBox being so narrow. Every office suite in the world has this issue. Wouldn't it be better to have it wider (allow to resize)? With font preview, perhaps?-fenixproductions
Son, you USE the [default] font you're given and you like it! :P No, but I figure the reason it's not done is because it would make sense.
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The real question which came to my mind is: will they ever do anything to Draw or focus on Writer only?
Seriously, remembering many OO versions I can see applications prioritized as: Wrter, Calc, Impress and Draw. For me "they" are reinventing the wheel over and over again. Same discussions from time to time and empty slogans about "MS Office replacement".
My idea for Libre is: no GUI changes yet but keep it stable instead, integrate Thunderbird somehow, finish Draw (or support Inkscape) and give true OneNote replacement. If it works it will be first real step for throwing MS away.
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Another, more detailed mockup.
[ You are not allowed to view attachments ]
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I wonder what all that "drop UIs users are used to" stuff is about. There are several good reasons that the current UI has been consistent for so long...
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Looks good.
Have to say I like it. :)
Nice to see they're obviously thinking "wide screen" monitor layout - as opposed to Ubuntu who seems to be fixated on stripping down and jamming themselves into "tablet" and "netbook" layouts. Especially with that "new direction" they've unilaterally announced for their future desktop.
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I wonder what all that "drop UIs users are used to" stuff is about. There are several good reasons that the current UI has been consistent for so long...
-Tuxman
Sometimes I am just thinking the answer is "We can't make it good so will make it looking nice" but it may be too unfair.
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Yeh, "looking nice" FAIL @ most of the "modern approaches"...
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But still, there's nothing to say something that works well can't also look good. I'm a real bug about interfaces. If it's something I'm going to staring at for several hours at a pop, it could at least look pretty AFAIC.
However, I am in complete agreement with fenixproductions on the subject of what their dev priorities should be. I'd be a lot happier (as would potential business customers) if they could focus on stability, product 'completeness,' and doing something about load and switch speeds first. Perhaps they want to establish a highly visible distinction between Libre and Oo as a marketing move. Which is fine so long as the other more important issues don't get back-burnered while their team futzes with the 'fun' stuff.
Just my 2 anyway.
:)
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Eww, the first screenshots remind me of Quicktime Player. I hope that is a mockup for the Mac version.
UPDATED: or Linux version. Although in that case, I'm sure there would be a "Windows look" theme.
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However, I am in complete agreement with fenixproductions on the subject of what their dev priorities should be. I'd be a lot happier (as would potential business customers) if they could focus on stability, product 'completeness,' and doing something about load and switch speeds first. -40hz
The good news is that's exactly what they're doing in this version. In v3.4 they'll begin to add new features according to the dev roadmap.
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I'm looking forward to the release regardless. Imagine all the good ideas people were thinking of while OpenOffice was stagnating. And I do like the idea of a sidebar.
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However, I am in complete agreement with fenixproductions on the subject of what their dev priorities should be. I'd be a lot happier (as would potential business customers) if they could focus on stability, product 'completeness,' and doing something about load and switch speeds first. -40hz
The good news is that's exactly what they're doing in this version. In v3.4 they'll begin to add new features according to the dev roadmap.
-zridling
That is very good news indeed! :)
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These are not official mockups. Just some designs by some guy at deviantart.
http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273
@OP should have posted this vital info. Renders the whole discussion useless :P
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These are not official mockups. Just some designs by some guy at deviantart.
http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273
@OP should have posted this vital info. Renders the whole discussion useless :P
-InstantFundas
Uh, I did. Right there in the first sentence: "Web Upd8 has the latest LibreOffice UI mockups...." And it's also in the subject line. :huh:
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These are not official mockups. Just some designs by some guy at deviantart.
http://pauloup.deviantart.com/gallery/28216273
@OP should have posted this vital info. Renders the whole discussion useless :P
-InstantFundas
Not really.
These mockups have some great ideas. And Libre is very open to suggestions.
So until somebody at Libre says this particular concept is a complete crock and won't be considered, it remains part of the meme surrounding LibreOffice. And being an open software project, there's also nothing to stop the implementation that interface as a side project even if the Document Foundation's LibreOffice programming team decides to ignore it. (I say ignore because you can bet somebody has already brought it to their attention.)
There's even a page on their website specifically for UX and Visual designers. Link here (http://www.libreoffice.org/get-involved/ux-visual-designers/).
UX/Visual Designers
Primary points of contact: the Design Team wiki page and the Design mailing list.
LibreOffice aims to be a great tool for people to let them create, edit and share any kind of information - to enable them to turn their ideas into documents. But offering that much capability requires the software to be easy and intuitive to use.
The LibreOffice Design Team wants to, "Make it just work, and look great, too!" We set out to do this by offering user experience [UX] design and visual identity design.
We need people to get involved in one or some of the following areas:
- User experience: User experience considers the user's point of view even before and also during the use of LibreOffice. It aims for productivity, usability and enjoyment and targets both the the LibreOffice project's Web resources and the LibreOffice software. If you're interested in or have expertise in research, design and evaluation methods, we want to hear from you!
- Visual identity design: Visual identity design is about creating stunning artwork to be used in the LibreOffice productivity suite, in the LibreOffice project's Web infrastructure, and in the LibreOffice project's marketing material. It is also about improving the quality and consistency of the visual branding language, which represents our whole community.
- Accessibility: Accessibility is about making the software usable for everyone: people with and people without special needs. To achieve this challenging goal, we implement the laws and technologies that are that are widely-recognized requisites in the field.
- User support and training: This is about sharing your experience when providing support and training for end users. It helps us identify important areas for improvement and establish essential requirements.
Consequently, if you'd like to work on improvements that target both the community and our large end-user base, then the Design Team is the right place for you.
To contact the Design Team, please visit the Design Team wiki page and sign-up for the Design mailing list.
That's the beauty of GPL projects - you never have to say: Never! The very existence of the LibreOffice fork is itself proof of that.
:)
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Note: DevArt is consulted for design ideas and inspiration a lot more often than most people realize - so don't rule something out just because it's found there. I've seen many interface concepts displayed on DeviantArt that mysteriously appear in software products later on.
"Coincidence? You be the judge..." as the saying goes. ;D
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Uh, I did. Right there in the first sentence: "Web Upd8 has the latest LibreOffice UI mockups...." And it's also in the subject line. :huh:
-zridling
Mockups can be official and unofficial. If the mockups come from the official team it means that the proposed designs could very well make into the actual product. Any other mockups by independent designers are unofficial. They are unlikely to find their way into the final product, unless the product developers embraces it, in which case, it becomes the official mockup. :)
Not really.
These mockups have some great ideas. And Libre is very open to suggestions.
So until somebody at Libre says this particular concept is a complete crock and won't be considered, it remains part of the meme surrounding LibreOffice. And being an open software project, there's also nothing to stop the implementation that interface as a side project even if the Document Foundation's LibreOffice programming team decides to ignore it. (I say ignore because you can bet somebody has already brought it to their attention.)
There's even a page on their website specifically for UX and Visual designers. Link here.
Note: DevArt is consulted for design ideas and inspiration a lot more often than most people realize - so don't rule something out just because it's found there. I've seen many interface concepts displayed on DeviantArt that mysteriously appear in software products later on.
I agree what you say, but my initial argument still holds - that they are not official, so don't pin your hopes on THIS particular design. And just like you said, there could be and IS dozens of Liberoffice designs floating around the web, any of which (or none) could becomes the actual UI.
I just want to say that if you don't label a mockup as unofficial, people assume they come from the developer.
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I just want to say that if you don't label a mockup as unofficial, people assume they come from the developer.
-InstantFundas
Well...I didn't assume the mockup was from the developer because zridling's link was to Web Upd8 as opposed to documentfoundation.org. But I guess I can (sort of) see what you're saying. :)
Mockups can be official and unofficial. If the mockups come from the official team it means that the proposed designs could very well make into the actual product. Any other mockups by independent designers are unofficial. They are unlikely to find their way into the final product, unless the product developers embraces it, in which case, it becomes the official mockup. :)
-InstantFundas
That would be true only if the interface "look" was hard-coded into Libre Office. But there's nothing to stop them from making the UI 'skinnable' to allow for easy integration of 3rd-party UI themes. My understanding is that eventually giving the user the option to customize the interface was one of the design goals for LO.
And again, LO is an open source project. Just because the development team may choose not to use this particular UI, there's nothing stopping someone else from implementing and releasing it. If enough people like it, that will be more likely to occur than not.
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I just thought I'd chime in and say that I did assume they were official mockups because I don't follow LibreOffice close enough to know that documentfoundation.org is the official developer and I didn't think it would be unusual for another website (Web Upd8, which I've never heard of before) to post news about (official) mockups.
It's not uncommon for news blogs to get (sometimes exclusive) screens or information from official sources and report on it. I assumed this was the case with these mockups.
Although if I had bothered to click through to the article and read it, it does make it clear that these are not official. So my ignorance is mostly my own fault. :D
Since these are just fan-made images I do agree that it changes the discussion somewhat, from "Oh, look what they're considering" to "Oh, look what someone who doesn't necessarily have any influence on the decision thinks they should consider."
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BTW: Downloaded the newest Libre release and got a chance to use it pretty heavily today.
It seems lighter on it's feet than Oo. Wonder if it's really true - or just wishful thinking on my part. :huh:
Anybody else notice that to be the case?
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I just thought I'd chime in and say that I did assume they were official mockups because I don't follow LibreOffice close enough to know that documentfoundation.org is the official developer and I didn't think it would be unusual for another website (Web Upd8, which I've never heard of before) to post news about (official) mockups.
It's not uncommon for news blogs to get (sometimes exclusive) screens or information from official sources and report on it. I assumed this was the case with these mockups.
Although if I had bothered to click through to the article and read it, it does make it clear that these are not official. So my ignorance is mostly my own fault. :D
Since these are just fan-made images I do agree that it changes the discussion somewhat, from "Oh, look what they're considering" to "Oh, look what someone who doesn't necessarily have any influence on the decision thinks they should consider."
-Deozaan
Ah! At least someone agrees with me. :)
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Ubuntu follows openSUSE, Redhat, and Fedora in announcing that the distro will use LibreOffice from now on. Woohoo! :D
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/open-source/ubuntu-opts-for-libreoffice-over-oracles-openoffice/8122
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Nice! I was wondering when they'd start including it in the distros. :)
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Yes. Very good. Especially in the wake of Microsoft, IBM, and the usual crowd predictably announcing their continued support for Oo and Oracle. And so far, with absolutely no anckowledgement on their part of LibreOffice or the Document Foundation's existence.
They must be Zork fans; "If you can't see the Grue, it can't eat you" :P
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[ You are not allowed to view attachments ] (http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/01/the-document-foundation-announces-first-release-of-libreoffice.ars)
v.3.3_Stable released yesterday morning and can be downloaded here (http://www.libreoffice.org/download/).
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/01/the-document-foundation-announces-first-release-of-libreoffice.ars
TDF got off to a good start and has attracted a lot of enthusiasm from former OOo contributors; Google, Red Hat, Canonical, and Novell are among its corporate supporters. The development effort so far has been reasonably productive. Contributors have been able to enhance LibreOffice with features that Sun had resisted accepting upstream, including parts of Novell's popular Go-OOo patch set. The LibreOffice developers have also incorporated significant improvements taken from the OpenOffice.org 3.3. The new features included in LibreOffice 3.3 improve the office suite's feature set, usability, and interoperability with other formats. For example, it has improved support for importing documents from Lotus Word Pro and Microsoft Works. Another key new feature is the ability to import SVG content and edit SVG images in LibreOffice Draw. Navigation features in Writer have been improved, the thesaurus got an overhaul, and the dialogs for printing and managing title pages got major updates. LibreOffice Calc touts better Excel interoperability and faster Excel file importing. The maximum size of a Calc spreadsheet has increased to 1 million rows.
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Funny thing: In openSUSE, it automatically deletes OpenOffice when you install LibreOffice unless you check the option to keep OpenOffice. ha!!
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(see attachment in previous post (http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/01/the-document-foundation-announces-first-release-of-libreoffice.ars)) (https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=25309.msg233843#msg233843)
v.3.3_Stable released yesterday morning and can be downloaded here (http://www.libreoffice.org/download/).
http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2011/01/the-document-foundation-announces-first-release-of-libreoffice.ars
-zridling
Been using it for a few days now and I'm very happy with it so far. Does seem to be lighter and more responsive. Some minor but nice cosmetic improvements too! :Thmbsup:
Note: if you have RC4, it's the same as the final build. Per the LibreOffice website release note for V3.3 Final:
This release is bit-for-bit identical to the Release Candidate 4, so you don't need to download or reinstall if you have that version already.
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If this signals accelerated dev for the OOo code base (obviously now under the banner of LibreOffice) then I'm thrilled. I've always seen OOo as having tremendous potential but development seemed rather slow considering how much dev and corporate support their was behind the thing. So far LibreOffice seems to have made more improvements faster than OOo ever did, which is promising. I have yet to test it, I think I'll wait for the next major release, but I'm glad this is happening, not just because it was necessitated by the Oracle buy-out, but because OOo was stagnating a bit anyway.
- Oshyan
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If this signals accelerated dev for the OOo code base (obviously now under the banner of LibreOffice) then I'm thrilled. I've always seen OOo as having tremendous potential but development seemed rather slow considering how much dev and corporate support their was behind the thing. So far LibreOffice seems to have made more improvements faster than OOo ever did, which is promising. - Oshyan-JavaJones
Exactly! And when you figure most communication is web/network-based rather than in ODF or MS-OOXML formats, there's only so much you can do anymore with a word processor -- especially in the age when few can spell or type more than 140 characters. I mean, who has the time to read 200 characters! v3.3 was for stability; v.3.4 should bring some much wanted new features.
:P
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Here's a short illustrated article on 3.3's few new features:
http://www.linuxjournal.com/content/libreoffice-33-release-brings-new-features
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It opens in less than a second on my old computer under openSUSE Linux. And the preloader's been gone a while now. I regularly open a 6.2mb spreadsheet file from the desktop and it takes just over a second. No way I can be unhappy with that response. I do hope, though, that if future versions bring "heavy" new features, the user will be able to include/install them modularly. I don't need everything, just Writer, Calc, and Formula.
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There's a no-install portable version available for Windows over at www.portableapps.com :Thmbsup:
Just added it to my "writing toolkit" for when I need something more heavyweight than Tomahawk or AngelWriter. :)
Works very nicely when running of a USB key after a slight startup lag more due to the USB media than anything else. Run from a folder on your hard drive, the "portable" version is very quick to start.
Good stuff!
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There's a no-install portable version available for Windows over at www.portableapps.com :Thmbsup:
-40hz
Thanks! I'm adding it to my PortableApps Launcher as we speak.
UPDATE: Ugh! It doesn't work because I store my portable apps in my dropbox and LibreOffice Portable can't run from a directory with a space in it.
I guess I need to reinstall dropbox on all of my machines and customize it to remove that "My" from the directory name... >:(