Total Commander GUI evolutions

Only forum where polls are allowed. You may announce a new poll in the matching support forum.

Moderators: white, Hacker, petermad, Stefan2

How do you think TC GUI should change?

I'd like to have full skin support
51
12%
I'd like to have a smaller/cleaner interface
57
13%
I only want new "modern" icons/fonts
53
12%
I want new selectable "sets" of icons (themes support)
45
10%
Current TC GUI rocks, don't change it!
87
20%
I’m satisfied with TC GUIs but I'm not against changes
137
32%
 
Total votes: 430

User avatar
squeller
Member
Member
Posts: 134
Joined: 2005-06-23, 15:30 UTC

Post by *squeller »

I'm very happy with new icon sets like the one of stickynomad.

Most important to me is: Don't never never ever overload TC with bloat. This program is running so smoothly even on the oldest, crappiest clients. Skin support does often mean bloat support.
trigger
New Member
New Member
Posts: 1
Joined: 2005-05-25, 08:19 UTC

Post by *trigger »

The great thing about TC is the simplicity. If skins support would be added, the straight forwardness would be lost. I would not use it if it would be implemented.

Peter
User avatar
MPS
Junior Member
Junior Member
Posts: 90
Joined: 2004-07-27, 15:57 UTC
Location: Poland
Contact:

Post by *MPS »

skins take up more memory, which i dont need. modernized icons would be nice thou.
fonts - i can configure myself
petar_b
Junior Member
Junior Member
Posts: 6
Joined: 2009-05-24, 22:57 UTC
Location: Belgium

Post by *petar_b »

hpg wrote:I will support In creating a new skin-able GUI for total commander if CG would like. I used Skin in some of my applications and the only thing I takes is about 100-200 kB of code. Skins should be an optional feature and a standard skin should be implemented! :-)
There are people who would like bigger buttons, cleaner UI, whatever, either due to convenience or due to disability (short sight, etc), bigger fonts, etc.

Older people like the functionality, but some of them tend to have UI that looks like Windows explorer.

What's wrong with tiny small skins that exist for winrar??? It's so small tool, but with a skin it becomes like born for vista, or xp..

Having skins would solve all those above mentioned problems.

Why not ? This tool is fantastic, but lots of new customers tend to have vista alike circus... so why to push them away, give them skins like : origianl, xp, vista and everyone is happy, you get new customers, and customers get perfect tool with fancy look. It's only a choice !

BTW, if I may ADD to wishlist: I want option to replace windows search (F3) button with search from TC !
User avatar
Thunderchild
Junior Member
Junior Member
Posts: 41
Joined: 2006-03-15, 21:50 UTC
Location: Ilmenau, Germany

Post by *Thunderchild »

Though the thread is a little older already, the topic is still relevant.
striker_69 wrote:Come on, people! You're talking like you're working on a 486 machine with 64 MB RAM!

In a modern world, why, why keep trying to make a program fit on a single disk thereby sacrificing many other features that might have been welcome by many??! As if we have only a few hundred megs on our hard drives. Why keep distributing the software on a diskette, when CDs are being used more and more? (well here I must correct myself - according to a recent interview, Christian is going to distribute new versions on a CD).
It's become (in my opinion) a bad habit of living in bliss. HDs have become so cheap, CPUs so fast that we don't care anymore. Just because the hardware isn't the limiting factor any more for the most parts, we shouldn't abandon the principle of modesty.
Look at it from a new, contemporary perspective: every calculation needs energy. Every useless calculations wastes energy. It's as simple as that. I don't need fancy, 3D-accelerated animations when I alt-tab (or an operating system that requires half a Gig of RAM for itself, for that matter).
Computers are getting faster and faster, but strangely they take the same time to boot (or even more) as they did 10 years ago.
striker_69 wrote:There are people who would like bigger buttons, cleaner UI, whatever, either due to convenience or due to disability (short sight, etc), bigger fonts, etc.
In that case they would want it system-wide. And to that respect Windows hasn't really been a shining beacon anyways.
striker_69 wrote:Older people like the functionality, but some of them tend to have UI that looks like Windows explorer.
Then they should use Exploder. Many advanced or defining functions of TC don't even work with an explorer-like layout, like two single keystrokes to copy a file (F5, Enter). It's a different paradigm.
striker_69 wrote:Having skins would solve all those above mentioned problems.
And create new ones. From non-standard behavior (like keyboard focus or window borders) to security concerns (hello Anti-Virus-Companies, why do all those virus scanners need to be skinned). Just to name one, every once in a while there is discovered a new overflow in some graphics library making it vulnerable to manipulated images.
striker_69 wrote:give them skins like : origianl, xp, vista
Again, if the user wants a skin, he would most likely want it system wide. It's my guess that a considerable number of TC users belong to a group of people that prefer efficiency and a homogeneous environment. Think of the mess both on your screen and in your memory if every one of your tools comes with an own skin engine.

The only thing I might change about TC's default look is the font - using bold sans serif may be a safe thing to do because it's available on _really_ all Windows versions, but it makes TC look like an outdated Win3 app, too.
Gruß | Greetings | Quapla'
"All I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by."
Shezed
Junior Member
Junior Member
Posts: 8
Joined: 2011-06-03, 21:23 UTC

Post by *Shezed »

It's an old topic, but i would love skin support not that they should be built in but to allow the user to create there own custom skins
Andem
New Member
New Member
Posts: 1
Joined: 2011-06-14, 08:49 UTC

Post by *Andem »

trigger wrote:The great thing about TC is the simplicity. If skins support would be added, the straight forwardness would be lost. I would not use it if it would be implemented.

Peter
I like the look of it, but Skins would be a nice option. Another idea would be to change the default font style from bold to regular.
User avatar
JohnFredC
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 886
Joined: 2003-03-14, 13:37 UTC
Location: Sarasota Florida

Post by *JohnFredC »

IMO skins are not needed, but better control over colors (tree colors specifically) would be welcome.
Licensed, Mouse-Centric, moving (slowly) toward Touch-centric
User avatar
Herr Mann
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 574
Joined: 2004-05-30, 17:11 UTC
Location: Niedersachsen, Deutschland

Post by *Herr Mann »

This topic is almost as old as the Total Commander itself.
An endless story …
the tree view, for example, looks even like the win3.1 file manager !!!
I removed the vertical lines in the Tree

totalcmd.ini (or wincmd.ini)
[colors]
TreeLineColor=-2

It looks better, but I wish the [+] would be replaced by a > like the Windows(7) Explorer
I like the look of it, but Skins would be a nice option.
I think wo don’t need a Skin support, but we need a adaptation/adjustment to the new Windows design. Precisely so that it does not look like Win 3.11

First - i called it up already – replace the Tree arrows.

And one of my favorite themes, the Icons!

Why does the TC not use the Windows Explorer Filetype Icons completely?
Why does the TC use *.icl for a couple of filestypes?
So that for example the packet/compressed Files must use the same Icon.
There are people who would like bigger buttons, cleaner UI, whatever, either due to convenience or due to disability (short sight, etc), bigger fonts, etc.
One further point is the maximum size [32*32] of the icons.
I looks terrible when I use the thumbsview …
Sob
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 941
Joined: 2005-01-19, 17:33 UTC

Post by *Sob »

Herr Mann wrote:... but I wish the [+] would be replaced by a > like the Windows(7) Explorer
It would work great for everyone if TC used system treeview controls, but it seems that all trees in TC are in fact custom-drawn listboxes. I guess there's probably some good reason for that.

But as with most custom-drawn things, almost nowhere it looks correct. It looks bad for you on Win7 with new theme (arrows vs. plus/minus). It looks less bad but still not completely correct on XP or Win7 with classic theme (dotted vs. solid lines, and while I'm nitpicking, the frame around +/- also should not be black ;).

So I'm for improvements too. If it doesn't mean just hardcoded arrows of course.
User avatar
ghisler(Author)
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 48005
Joined: 2003-02-04, 09:46 UTC
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Post by *ghisler(Author) »

The [+] is actually taken from the current theme(!), it's not drawn by TC itself.
Author of Total Commander
https://www.ghisler.com
User avatar
Lefteous
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 9535
Joined: 2003-02-09, 01:18 UTC
Location: Germany
Contact:

Post by *Lefteous »

2ghisler(Author)
You have to use the following parts and states in order to display the Vista style progressive disclosure elements:

Part: TVP_HOTGLYPH
States: HGLPS_CLOSED, HGLPS_OPENED
User avatar
ghisler(Author)
Site Admin
Site Admin
Posts: 48005
Joined: 2003-02-04, 09:46 UTC
Location: Switzerland
Contact:

Post by *ghisler(Author) »

I see - do you know whether they are available in all themes on Vista and 7?
Author of Total Commander
https://www.ghisler.com
User avatar
Lefteous
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 9535
Joined: 2003-02-09, 01:18 UTC
Location: Germany
Contact:

Post by *Lefteous »

2ghisler(Author)
Well if a theme doesn't support this parts and states its simply buggy ;-)
Sob
Power Member
Power Member
Posts: 941
Joined: 2005-01-19, 17:33 UTC

Post by *Sob »

ghisler(Author) wrote:The [+] is actually taken from the current theme(!), it's not drawn by TC itself.
Even when Windows Classic theme is selected? Or when Themes service is stopped? Because otherwise the [+] is themed, but in these two cases it looks different from all other [+]es in system (frame color, black vs. probably clBtnShadow). Just out of curiosity, not that it bothers me too much.
Post Reply