I create my first app for Windows 10. I will use the app for Windows 10 desktop and phone. Great that one code will run on desktop and phone. In my old application for Windows Phone 8 I use Panorama control with three tabs. But I can not decide which component to use - SplitView or Pivot? For desktop better suited SplitView . For phone better suited - Pivot. Need to choose one solution. What do you advise?
First, your following statement is incorrect.
For desktop better suited SplitView. For phone better suited - Pivot.
SplitView and Pivot are for different purposes -
SplitView consists of two parts - Pane and Content. The Content is where the main content goes. The Pane is really just a drawer. This control is meant to provide a very common drawer navigation pattern to the new UWP apps, similar to many iOS and Android apps.
Note that this control is also very flexible, you can use AdaptiveTrigger to customize its DisplayMode to completely hide the Pane when it's on a phone, and make it always visible when on a desktop machine.
Prior to UWP, the original Metro Design heavily relied on the Panorama control (i.e. the Hub control in UWP) for menu navigation and this later becomes a bit boring since almost all the apps that need a menu, use a Pano. So having a new SplitView will definitely help developers be a bit more creative on the main layout design. And besides, the drawer navigation is so widely used across other platforms and users generally know how to interact with it.
Pivot on the other hand, is simply a swipe-enabled tab control. It's meant to display information at the same level and should never be used like a navigation frame. Leave the navigation bit to the SplitView or the old panorama style Hub control, or whatever creative ways you can come up with.
So to answer your question, you don't have to choose one between them, these two controls can co-exist since one does the navigation and the other shows the information, just like what's in the picture below -
I have a mobile app. On the two major smartphone platforms, I employ tabbed UI - there are 3-4 screens with pretty much independent functionality, they exchange info very occasionally, most of the time screen switching is performed by the user, in arbitrary order.
Windows Phone 7 does not have a tab control, and page navigation assumes a stack model (you go back to where you came from). What would be a sensible WP7 alternative to that kind of UI?
The general Phone-7 replacement for the tab paradigm would be either a Pivot or a Panorama. Which you choose depends a lot on exactly on what you're showing, but generally speaking the Pivot is probably what you're after.
I would recomend a pivot control
WP7 UI is built around the metro style and it was a deliberate choice to not have a tab control. (have a look at the official guidelines here) I would recommend you use a metro control like panorama or pivot.
I'm from a Windows programming background when writing tools, but have been programming using Carbon and Cocoa for the past year. I have introduced myself to Mac by, I admit it, hiding from UI programming. I've been basically wapping my OpenGL code in a view, then staying in my comfort zone using my platform agnostic OpenGL C++ code as usual.
However, now I want to start porting one of my more sophisticated applications to Mac OS.
Typically I use the standard Visual Studio dockable MDI approach, which is excellent, but very Windows-like. From using a Mac primarily now for a while, I don't tend to see this sort of method used for Mac UIs. Even Xcode doesn't support the idea of drag and drop/dockable views, unfortunately. I see docked views with splitter panels, but that's about it.
The closest thing I've seen to the Visual Studio approach is Photoshop CS4, which is pretty nice.
So what is the general consensus on this? Is there are more Mac-like way of achieving the same thing that I haven't seen? If not, I'm happy to write a window manager in Cocoa myself, so that I can finally delve in an learn what looks like an excellent API.
Note, I don't want to use QT or any other cross-platform libraries. The whole point is that I want to make a Mac app look like a Mac app, leave the Windows app looking like a Windows app. I always find the cross-platform libraries tend to lose this effect, and when I see a native Mac UI, with fancy Cocoa transitions and animations, I always smile. It's also a good excuse for me to learn Cocoa.
That being said, if there is an Open Source Cocoa library to do this, I'd love to know about it! I'd love to see how someone else achieves this, and would help smooth the Cocoa learning curve.
Cheers,
Shane
UPDATE: I forgot to mention a critical point. I support plugins, which can have their own UI to display various plugin specific information. I don't know which plugins will be loaded and I don't know where their UI will live, if I don't support docking. I'd love to hear people's thoughts on this, specifically: How do I support a plugin view architecture, if the UI can't change? Where do I put the plugin views?
Coming from a Windows background, you feel the need to have docking windows, but is it really essential to the app? Apple's philosophy (in my opinion) is that the designer knows better than the user how things should look and work. For example, iTunes is a pretty sophisticated app, but it doesn't let you change the UI around, change the skin, etc., because Apple wants to keep it consistent. They offer the full view, the mini player, and a handful of different viewing options, but they don't let you pull the source list off into a separate window, or dock it in other positions. They think it should be on the left, so there it stays...
You said you "want to make a Mac app look like a Mac app", and as you pointed out, Mac apps don't tend to have docking windows. Therefore, implementing your own docking windows is probably a step in the wrong direction ;)
+1 to Ken's answer.
From a user perspective unless its integral to the app like it is in Adobe CS or Eclipse i want everything as concise as possible and all the different options and displays out of my way so i can focus on the document.
I think you will find with mac users that those who have the "user skill" to make use of rearranging panels will in most cases opt for hot key bindings instead, and those who dont have that level of "skill" youre just going to confuse.
I would recommend keeping it as simple as possible.
One thing that's common among many Mac apps is the ability to hide all the chrome and focus on your content. That's the point behind the "tic tac" toolbar control in the top right corner of many windows. A serious weakness of many docking UIs is that they expect you to have the window take up most of the screen, because the docked panels can obscure content. Even if docked panels are collapsable, the space left by them is often just wasted and filled with white space. So, if you build a docking panel into your interface, you should expect it to be visible most of the time. For example, iTunes' source list is clearly designed to be visible all the time, but you can double-click a playlist to open it in a new window.
To get used to the range of Mac controls, I'd suggest you try doing some serious work with some apps that don't have a cross-platform UI; for example, the iWork apps, Interface Builder or Preview. Take note of where controls appear and why—in toolbars, in bottom bars, in inspectors, in source lists/sidebars, in panels such as IB's Library or the Font and Color panels, in contextual HUDs. Don't forget the menu bar either. Get an idea of the feel of controls—their responsiveness, modality, sizing, grouping and consistency. Try to develop some taste—not everything is perfect; just try iCal if you want to have something to make fun of.
Note that there's no "one size fits all" for controls, which can be an issue with docking UIs. It's important to think about workflow: how commonly used the control would be, whether you can replace it with direct manipulation, whether a visible indication of its state is necessary, whether it's operable from the keyboard and mouse where appropriate, and so forth. Figure out how the control's placement and behavior lets the user work more efficiently.
As a simple example of example of a good versus bad control placement and behavior in otherwise-decent applications, compare image masking in OmniGraffle and Keynote. In OmniGraffle, this uses the Image inspector where you have to first click on an unlabeled button ("Natural size") in order to enable the appropriate controls, then adjust size and position away in a low-fidelity fashion with an image thumbnail or by typing percentages into fields. Trying to resize the frame directly behaves in a bizarre and counterintuitive fashion.
In Keynote, masking starts with a sensibly named menu item or toolbar item, uses a HUD which pops up the instant you click on a masked image and allows for direct manipulation including a sensible display of the extent of the image you're masking. While you're dragging a masked image around, it even follows the guides. Advanced users can ignore the HUD entirely, just double-clicking the image to toggle mask editing and using the handles for sizing. It should be easy to see, with a few caveats (e.g. the state of "Edit Mask" mode should be visible in the HUD rather than just from the image; the outer border of the image you're masking should be more effectively used) Keynote is substantially better at this, in part because it doesn't use an inspector.
That said, if you do have a huge number of options and the standard tabbed inspector layout doesn't work for you, check out the Omni Group's OmniInspector framework. Try to use it for good, and hopefully you'll figure out how to obsess over UI as much as you do over graphics now :-)
(running in slow motion, reaching out in panic) Nnnnnoooooooo!!!!!
:-) Seriously, as I mentioned in reply to Ken's excellent answer, trying to force a "Windowsism" on an OS X UI is definitely a bad idea. In my opinion, the biggest problem with Windows UI is third-party developers inventing new and inconsistent ways of presenting UI, rather than being consistent and following established conventions. To a Mac user, that's the sign of a terrible application. It's that way for a reason.
I encourage you to rethink your UI app's implementation from the ground up with the Mac OS in mind. If you've done your job well, the architecture and model (sans platform-specific implementation) should clearly translate to any platform.
In terms of UI, you've been using a Mac for a year, so you should have a pretty good idea of "the norm". If you have doubts, it's best to post a question specifically detailing what you need to present and your thoughts on how you might do it (or asking how if you have no idea).
Just don't whack your app with the ugly stick by forcing it to behave as if it were running in Windows when it's clearly not. That's the kiss of death for an app to Mac users.
I am porting an application from iPhone to BlackBerry. BlackBerry apps tend not to look as polished as iPhone, but naturally, I would like to maintain as much polish as I can, without breaking any important UI conventions. Are there any UI components that can help with this?
NB. I am planning to follow all important UI conventions. For example, I will use the BlackBerry Menu instead of a tab bar for providing access to help and some other advanced options.
Links
Make BlackBerry UI Components Look Like iPhone Components
You can extend blackberry controls with custom drawing, or implement own one extending Field class. Also you may draw a bitmap background (skin) for each control state.
See also
UPDATE How to – Implement advanced buttons, fields and managers
naviina - iPhone-style Field for Blackberry
SO - Blackberry User Interface Design - Customizable UI
This is one of those instances where providing the answer to the question you have asked is tantamount to helping commit a crime!
That sounds dramatic but as developers we have a responsibility to provide the user with a good experience - this means an experience that conforms to their expectations and makes it easy for them to Get Things Done!
I know how pissed off I get when developers implemented custom interfaces in desktop applications and there I have an entire keyboard and mouse to help me navigate!
If all I have is a touchscreen or a tiny trackball and buttons then I am going to be even more pissed off.
Unless you are revolutionising user input and design on Blackberry devices - which, no offence, I doubt you are - then stick to the conventions and guidelines for that platform.
Make your software easy to use and easy to learn - do not ask a user to relearn their own platform to use your app!
which of the following styles do you prefer?
An application which to perform tasks opens new forms
An application which keeps the various "forms" in different tabs
An application which is based on a PageControl and shows you the right tab depending on what you want to do.
Something else
Also do you have any good links for gui design?
From a programmers point of view, the PageControl solution quickly gets out of hand. Possibly too much code and certainly to many components on one form. (Originally this question was tagged Delphi, so I go from there.)
From a users point of view, the "opens new window" paradigm often is confusing. We people tend to think that we are able to multitask and handle many open windows and tasks, but we are not (we task switch at a loss of time like computers and add loss of accuracy).
Obviously this really depends on the type of application. But I would tend to a paradigm as Chrome and Firefox show in their latest incarnations:
keep the various forms in different tabs
let the user detach a tab into its own form (dock and undock via drag%drop)
add a good way of navigation
I implement something like an SDI as main screen of an application too. Look at something like "outlook style". Navigation, list of objects, object details in different panes, some additional panes like a cockpit. And then open a new window/form for certain tasks (some modal, some non modal), but short lived. After the email is written, it is sent and closes the window. But I have, if I am capable of doing so, the possibility to work on multiple emails at the time.
Look at the problem. If it has dashboard character, take "outlook style" or so. If the users are a wide spread, heterogeneous, non computer savvy crowd, use SDI or forms on tabs. If you write for programmers, you might go for multiple forms, just because we tend to think that we can handle it. And it works for multiple screens (hopefully).
MDI is the worst choice possible, in my opinion. There's nothing I hate more than having to resize a bunch of windows, or tile them or whatever.
Tabs are bad, too, especially if you have more than one row of them (or if you have one row but still have more tabs than will fit, and have to use some funky scrollbar or "more" button with them).
I would rather see the programmer think about the problem and just show me what I need to see based on what I'm doing as a user. Implementing the different user interfaces in your programs as user controls (as opposed to discrete forms) and then showing them or hiding them based on the current context is the way to go.
The Tabbed form is a good idea if you use a frame for each tab content. This keeps you out of trouble from getting too much code in one single form unit. Try to do the same as Google Chrome. I personally create a menu with the options that are actually frames that loads only when the user asks for it, so there will never be many tabs visible unless the user needs them all opened.