Audacity Manual Contents

Peter 13Jun12: Looking almost there - and looking good +0.95

Can we please have the flags box that James has at the top of his mockup. I thought we had already achieved consensus (James, Gale and me certainly in favour) that this was the way to go.
I still think that James' positioning of the FAQ inside the "Using Audacity" at the top of that section is better - both aesthetically and functionally (the FAQs are all about the use of Audacity). I lik the larger boxwith the thinner border for it that James provides - if we were to leave it above the "Using Audacity" then I think we do need to retain the smaller box and the thinner border. FAQs seem to me to have equal prominence whether thay are placed above or inside "Using Audacity".
I also very much like the way that James has place the Manual's title inside the greenish information box. Looks much better like that IMO.
For my money the side nav bar does not necessarily need to be rigidly consistent with the page contents structure - but I would prefer to see FAQs promoted up the list in the side nav bar to be below contents and above tutorials.
I like the box around the preferences but I find the one wrapped around "More Details for the Project Window" more than somewhat distracting and would much prefer to see it removed.

Peter 13Jun12 later: with Bill's recent changes my vote goes to +1 (the best of Bill & James)
Bill 15June12: I think this is ready for prime time. +1
- Peter 15Jun12: +1 and this means we get a fresh look for the upcoming 2.0.1 release, which is great. Many thinks to Bill for all his hard work on this and to Gale too for all his reviewing and suggestions.
Gale 16Jun12:
- No obvious display problems (IE More Details border was fixed). I think the boxes inside the TOC add next to nothing; if we had bullets and lists as we should have (and I would want if I can find a fix some time), I would get rid of the boxes inside the TOC. As it is now though, I do want the box please for "More Details" as the design makes no sense otherwise. I suggest it would look better with "More Details" indented from left and the border enclosing "More Details for the Project Window" itself (so analogous with "Guide to the Project Window").
  - Bill: I've said elsewhere that I'm +1 for lists if and when we can get them working. I'm also fine with either losing all the grey boxes or boxing "More Details". I'm also OK with boxing the Prefs listing only, as that was originally done to set that off.
    Having tried boxing the entire "More Details" and "Prefs" sections I can say it doesn't work: since these sections can be different heights the bottoms of the boxes don't line up. It also messes up the side-by-side placement (don't know why, but adding a 1px border seems to cause the Camino rendering engine to think they're wider than they are; I'll have a look at this page in Chrome when I'm done editing here).
    Removed box around "More Details..." as I couldn't see why we were separating that from the project window image which it references.
    Increased indent of the "More Details" section.
    Added a horizontal rule under the window image - easy to remove if we want.
    Removed box around Prefs sections list - trivial to put back if we want it.
    - Gale: Although "More Details..." references "Guide to...", a box that enclosed the former would be analogous "design". I see the case for boxes in aiding visibility of links inside the box. It hardly helps at all in "Guide to", and it helps a bit in "More Details" (I tried boxing just around the "Details for importing" which looked odd, and have left it in around everything which I assume fazes Camino, and if it doesn't, needs more work). Boxing helps a lot in Prefs (just around the 16 link items). Assuming "More Details" can't be boxed as now, I prefer boxing Prefs only or will live with boxing Prefs and "Guide". I strongly prefer the Prefs box more "centred" as I have it now without being jammed against the right. I removed the HR.
- I added 5px padding at the bottom of the "translators" and green "Manual" divs (I know these are not actually note and intro divs but I think those too should actually have padding-top and -bottom to look nicer). I also added padding at the side of the "Help us with translation" text (the text was jammed against the right border when browser was maximised).
  - Bill: Fine with me. I take it you're OK with no left and right margins the way real intro and note divs have? I have a strong preference for them being full width.
    - Gale: Yes. It's padding-top and -bottom I want analogous to the padding-left and right they already have.
- On the position of FAQ, I think it's funny that until recently Peter wanted it outside "Using" and I didn't. Peter persuaded me on his "book" pages it should be outside and now he wants it inside again! I don't care that much about "inside" or "outside" and I think now it has been toned down a bit, it has roughly equal prominence inside or out, but that's the problem - I still feel it a serious distraction away from the main Manual content for repeat users. I reduced the padding at top and bottom so it now appears to be about the same as that around "Guide to the Project Window". I much prefer http://manual.audacityteam.org/m/index.php?title=User:Billw58/Front_Page_no_tables&oldid=18847 but I can just about live with the FAQ as it is now. Sidebar is "wrong" for Tutorials - maybe it looks better "wrong" - I'll try it "correct".
  - Bill: Well, folks are allowed to change their minds! I, too, have a mild preference for the FAQ section outside the Using section. But that makes it more "in your face" so wouldn't that be more of a distraction for repeat users?
    - Gale: I think it's easy to ignore it if outside, just as you ignore the green Manual div. You still know where it is if you need it.
- Why so much vertical space between bottom of "Quick where and how" and "Understanding..." and likewise with the two major sections to right?
  - Bill: To set them off. I've removed the extra space but I also think it makes sense to have a little extra space above "Understanding Audacity" and "Help with advanced topics". I have no strong preference either way.
    - Gale: I see the space needed as related to the padding on the FAQ (if we have it inside "Using"). As it is now I think 5px extra space above "Understanding Audacity" and "Help with advanced topics" would improve it (not done that).
- Do we want to try a smaller logo? I browser-scaled it to 450 px as an example, I think that is better with this "new look"?
  - Bill: I like the smaller logo. Should I scale it in photoshop? I could also get rid of the (small amount of) extra white space around it and give it a transparent background.
    - Gale: +1. The transparency may come in some day. too.

Bill 16Jun12: Responding down here as the above has enough indents!
- I've tried different boxing below the image:
  - Added a new "container_bottom_ref" div that encloses the "More Details" and "Prefs" sections: enable the border by setting "border: 1px" if you want to see the effect (which I do not like).
    - Gale: agreed I don't like it
    - Bill: OK, that's out.
  - "More Details" and "Preferences" now each appear to have three levels of indents
    - Gale: Much prefer Prefs as I last left it; I really don't think anything but the list should be indented.
    - Bill: OK, changed it back.
  - Boxed the stuff below "More Details" as an example.
  - To see the effect of attempting to box the entire "More Details" and "Prefs" sections, set "border: 1px" in the "left_ref" and "right_ref" divs, then resize the window and watch the boxes change size. Setting the width of "right_ref" to 50% causes the float to fail in all browsers (as I recall, haven't tried it recently).
    - Gale: Even if it worked, it doesn't help the eye focus on the lists which is the main point. Where are we on cross-browser acceptability of the "More Details" box, especially Camino? I think the "More Details" box adds so little to the real problem (the links underneath "Details for importing and exporting") that only boxing the Prefs list is the best compromise. I've left "More Details" with no box. The only thing against that is that the "More Details" border balances better with the "16 sections" text in Prefs.
    - Bill: Agreed boxing the entire sections is not helpful. This design (any design without floating real list items) seems to render properly in webkit and gecko.
  - Added "Preferences are divided into 16 sections" above the list of prefs sections: I really think it helps to make sense of what follows even if it unbalances the left and right sections a bit.
    - Gale: Seems a good idea, only other way to get that effect would be to have the list below the first paragraph.
    - Bill: Yes, I thought of having the list right under the heading. Tried it - doesn't really help with balancing the side by side divs there.
  - Changed the "Pref" template to get rid of the unused first parameter and embedded nonbreaking space.
  - Changed "container_prefs" to have margin-left: 0px and padding-left:20px
    - Gale: See above.
- Added 5px above "Understanding Audacity" and "Help with advanced topics"
- FAQ - both versions in play: pick your poison.
  - Gale: Needs a tie-breaker vote I guess. It's 2 for, 2 against at present.
  - Bill: Then changing my vote to FAQ above. Commented out FAQ div under Using.
- Logo
  - Transparency is out due to the drop shadows
  - I will create 450px, 400px and 350px wide versions of the logo and upload them
    - Gale: +1 for 450px, +0.5 for 400px
- Gale: Why does this design have the "Connect and record microphone or guitar" in the YFR Tutorial wrapping to next line? This stops the last lines of "Using Audacity" being at same vertical position. See current front page for comparison.
- Bill: The current front page also wraps that line, but at a few pixels narrower window width. It probably has to do with the fact that the right div has to be less than 50% width for the float to work.
- Gale: Just to confirm you have my +1 that this will be in 2.0.1 (barring a Camino fix).
- Bill: There is no problem with Camino with this design that I am aware of. Camino only had a problem with the floating real list items. All webkit browsers fail with my latest attempt at a fix (setting text-height to 6px) when the line wraps.
Gale: I trimmed the text alongside YFR and added more space above "Help with Advanced" - is that better? I think Prefs are as good as it will get now - go with it. I tried to line up the bottom of "More Details and Prefs". Is it possible to add more space between the "list" rows in "More Details" without breaking anything? PS. Your vote for FAQ "outside" was already counted in the 2:2 "draw".

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