doc/developer/lttv_gui_layout.txt

   1 GUI Layout
   2
   3
   4
   5
   6 In order to implement the GUI, choices has to be made based on habitual interfaces that we know users are familiar with. The inspiration for these choices came mainly from the Mozilla browser project and also from Openoffice, which are currently used as two userfriendly applications in various Linux distribution at the time of this writing.
   7
   8 This document describes the layout of the GUI in three sections : containers, menus and toolbars.
   9
  10 A status bar is also placed at the bottom of the window.
  11
  12 - Containers
  13
  14 elements hierarchy
  15
  16 Window Mainwindow
  17 |->vbox
  18    |->menus
  19    |->toolbar of the main window
  20    |->toolbar of the currently selected viewer
  21    |->notebook
  22    |  |->vpaned
  23    |  |->viewer's widget
  24    |  |->vpaned
  25    |  |->viewer's widget
  26    |  |->vpaned
  27    |  |->...
  28    |->Status bar
  29
  30 - Menus
  31
  32 Here is a short description of each menu entry
  33 *   by itself means a separator
  34
  35
  36 - File
  37 *New -> *Empty trace set : open a new window with an empty trace set.
  38         *Clone trace set : copy the content of the current window in a new
  39                            window.
  40         *
  41         *Tab : Opens a new tab.
  42 *Open : open a trace set. Calls a file selection dialog.
  43 *Close : close the current window.
  44 *Close Tab : close the current tab.
  45 *
  46 *Add trace : Add a trace to the window's traceset. Calls file selection dialog.
  47 *Remove trace : Removes a trace from the traceset.
  48 *Save : save the trace set. Calls a file save dialog of no current filename.
  49 *Save as : save a trace set. Calls a file save dialog.
  50 *
  51 *Quit : quit the program.
  52
  53 - Edit ? (not needed for now)
  54
  55 - View
  56 *Zoom In : Multiply the zoom factor by a certain quantity.
  57 *Zoom Out : Divide the zoom factor by a certain quantity.
  58 *Zoom Extended : Show the entire traceset's largest time interval.
  59 *Go to time : Keep same zoom, ask user for time to center view on and make
  60               it the current time.
  61 *Show time frame : ask user for time interval to show.
  62               (modify zoom and current event in consequence)
  63
  64 - Tools (this is an example of how viewer's menu entries should look like)
  65 *Move viewer up -> Moves the current viewer up one position.
  66 *Move viewer down -> Moves the current viewer down one position.
  67 *Remove : remove the current viewer
  68 *
  69 *DumpToFile -> *Dump Text (This is a text module which adds graphical menu
  70                            entries)
  71                *Dump binary
  72 * (separator between text tools and graphical tools implies different function
  73    to register each type of menu entries)
  74 *Insert Events View : insert this type of viewer
  75 *Insert ControlFlow View
  76 - Plugins
  77 *Load module : ask the user a module to load (list modules in search path).
  78 *Unload module : list all modules, click to choose, then unload button.
  79 *Add module search path : ask user for a new path (file selection dialog).
  80
  81 - Options
  82 //FIXME *Color : change the color of the currently selected element ?
  83 *Filter : Show traceset's filter option window.
  84 *Save configuration : Save the currently loaded modules/traceset/filters
  85                       to gconf.
  86
  87
  88 (aligned to the right)
  89 - Help
  90 *Content
  91 *About
  92
  93
  94 - Toolbar
  95
  96 The toolbar is separated in two parts : like the two lines used in Openoffice. The first one is applying to the top level window (or current tab) while the one below contains the current viewer's toolbar.
  97
  98 So we have something like this :
  99
 100 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 101 | Menus                                                                        |
 102 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 103 | Toolbar of the top level window                                              |
 104 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 105 | Toolbar of the current viewer                                                |
 106 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 107 ||Current Tab|                                                                 |
 108 |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------||
 109 ||viewers in vpaned                                                           ||
 110 ||                                                                            ||
 111 ||----------------------------------------------------------------------------||
 112 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 113 | Status bar                                                                   |
 114 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 115
 116
 117 The toolbar of the top level window is the only one described in this document, as the second one is defined by the viewers and specific to each of them.
 118
 119 This toolbar is mainly a selection of the menu entries.
 120
 121 New : New window with empty trace set.
 122 Open : open a trace set.
 123 Add Trace
 124 Remove Trace
 125 Save : save the current trace set.
 126 Save as
 127 *
 128 Zoom in
 129 (Show the current zoom factor, modifiable)
 130 Zoom out
 131 Zoom Extended
 132 Go to time (shows time directly)
 133 Show time frame (Could be a special field showing the time frame)
 134 *
 135 Move up current viewer
 136 Move down current viewer
 137 Delete current viewer
 138 *
 139 Add viewer's specific insertion buttons are added here.
 140
 141
 142 Mathieu Desnoyers, June 2003