Look and feel mechanism?

[Felix Bembrick]

On 9 December 2013 16:10, Scott Palmer <swpalmer at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
> > On Dec 8, 2013, at 9:18 PM, Felix Bembrick <felix.bembrick at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> <snip>
> >
> > Firstly, it will *never* be possible to completely emulate the native
> look
> > and feel.
>
> Sure it is. Though it may never be practical, for many of the reasons you
> have given.
>
> > My reasoning is: why bother?
>
> Because it matters. As computer literate developers, we often don't
> realize what trips other people up.  I get so frustrated with apps these
> days because they have become hard to use simply because the developers
> tried to define their own look and feel.  For example, Chrome and
> Firefox... Or Microsoft Office...
> Where did the title bar go in chrome?
> Where have all the menus gone in Chrome, Firefox andOffice?  I can find
> them, but when I have to play tech support over the phone to my parents
> these changes are massive problems. I ask my dad to move he window by
> dragging the title bar (please don't ask why he doesn't know to do this
> himself after decades of computer use) and he says "there is no title
> bar"... I the remember that yes, chrome did that... They got rid of a
> standard concept in the OS' windowing system and screed the end users.
>
> These apps became harder to use because of this "innovation" in the UI.
>
> Contrast this with applications on OS X where getting the UI right has
> always been an important priority for developers.  Because adhering to the
> system look and feel has always been strongly encouraged the system is much
> easier to use.
>
> > These days, many apps do not look 100% native and may have their own
> > controls or look and feel in general.
>
> Yes, but to what end? They are now more difficult to use.
>
> >  Why not channel all that massive
> > effort in constructing an emulated native look and feel into simply
> making
> > JavaFX better overall?
>
> But I agree here.  The general look isn't the main issue.. E.g. little
> variations in color and minor tweaks to a few pixels here and there don't
> really matter.  What does matter is when you change the order of buttons,
> like Okay & Cancel which have standard places that are different between
> Mac and Windows, or you move the About menu item from the Application menu
> on an OS X app to the help menu! because that is where you find it on
> Windows.  Those things matter.
>
>
> Scott
>
> >
> > Felix
> >
> >
> >
> > On 9 December 2013 12:35, Pedro Duque Vieira <
> pedro.duquevieira at gmail.com>wrote:
> >
> >> Thanks!
> >>
> >> @Jasper: Yes, that's very interesting! Forgot that was possible to do in
> >> CSS.
> >>
> >>
> >>> On Mon, Dec 9, 2013 at 12:15 AM, Stephen Winnall <steve at winnall.ch>
> wrote:
> >>>
> >>> It may be possible to change the LOOK with CSS, but not the FEEL, which
> >> is
> >>> where Java apps have traditionally failed big time.
> >>>
> >>> Some things that I don’t think can be changed with CSS:
> >>>
> >>> 1) texts
> >>> 2) order of buttons
> >>> 3) escape characters for shortcuts
> >>> 4) menus
> >>> 5) system-level stuff (double-clicking on files, dropping files on
> >>> applications, …)
> >>> 6) filesystem conventions
> >>> 7) ...
> >>>
> >>> I think FXML can fix some of these, but not all. So it seems to me
> that a
> >>> LaF in JFX will consist of at least:
> >>>
> >>>        - one or more CSS files
> >>>        - one or more FXML files
> >>>        - some plumbing at the system level
> >>>
> >>> It would be nice to have a set of proper LaFs for each major platform
> >> with
> >>> an appropriate common API.
> >>>
> >>> Steve
> >>>
> >>>> On 9 Dec 2013, at 00:20, Jasper Potts <jasper.potts at oracle.com>
> wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>> You can set skin classes from CSS so should be able to do everything
> >> you
> >>> could with Swing and more. With just a CSS file and skins as and when
> >>> needed.
> >>>>
> >>>> Jasper
> >>>>
> >>>>> On Dec 8, 2013, at 3:00 PM, Jonathan Giles <
> jonathan.giles at oracle.com
> >>>
> >>> wrote:
> >>>>>
> >>>>> At present there are no plans to introduce any further API or
> >>>>> functionality in this area, but if there is something you are wanting
> >>>>> then you should file feature requests in Jira.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> -- Jonathan
> >>>>>
> >>>>>> On 9/12/2013 11:54 a.m., Pedro Duque Vieira wrote:
> >>>>>> Hi,
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> Is there any Look and Feel mechanism in place, like the one in
> Swing?
> >>> That
> >>>>>> doesn't appear to exist..
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> Are there any plans to add one? You can only do so much with CSS...
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>> Thanks in advance, best regards,
> >>
> >>
> >> --
> >> Pedro Duque Vieira
> >>
>