[Finished] MP2 "Home" screen contents and navigation (1 Viewer)

[tourettes]

It would be nice if we can drop the concept of a "Basic" home and "Classic" home for MP2 (actually for MP1 as well )
It is the most confusing thing MP1 has for users and skinners.
There should only be one "Home" or "Start" screen.

Althou there are lot of down sides on the 2x home screen there still is some benefits from it in MP1 where we don't have any common editor for the home screen content. How does the home screen editing work in MP2 at the moment? Can user pick up the content instead of having to use the hard coded content that the skinner puts there (which wont ever work, unless it is a classic menu style list which is not good for the UI itself ).

 

[offbyone]

Getting OffTopic, maybe split the thread somewhere.

In MP2, a plugin defines in its plugin.xml if it has a transition from the Home screen to its own screen and what the (localisable) name of this transition is.
The home screen then simply provides a list of those entries as a flat list. You could compare it to the classic home in MP1. I have been trying to collect or implement new ideas how to present those better (RadialPanel).
IMHO forcing the user to decide what button to put where is bad usability. I'd rather propose that we "classify" transitions from home (plugins) so we can have some hierarchy in the navigation - but all without required user interaction.
Starting with the fact that 5 is a good amount of items in a list for the user to automatically memorize where an item sits here's an example:

• Audio
  • Music
  • Podcast
  • AudioBook
• Video
  • TV
  • Series
  • Movies
  • OnlineVideos
• Picture
  • Photo Album
  • Comics
• Info
  • Weather
  • News
  • System
• Settings

New Plugins will automatically enqueue below one of the main entries, depending on what they defined in the plugin.xml

 

[tourettes]

In MP2, a plugin defines in its plugin.xml if it has a transition from the Home screen to its own screen and what the (localisable) name of this transition is.
The home screen then simply provides a list of those entries as a flat list.

If end users could create the hierarcy for the plugins it would be solving the need for any external "menu editors". What the end user would have to be able to do is:

1) specify top level categories (movies, music, tv...)
2) specify does plugin (or command / anything that you can bind in MP2 to home menu) belong to root or child level

IMHO forcing the user to decide what button to put where is bad usability. I'd rather propose that we "classify" transitions from home (plugins) so we can have some hierarchy in the navigation - but all without required user interaction.
Starting with the fact that 5 is a good amount of items in a list for the user to automatically memorize where an item sits here's an example:

Forcing indeed is bad in this case, but we still could allow the user to build the plugin list/tree instead of having system to force it to the end user. A choise in this case is good to have. Just think if there are 5 hardcoded slots and space for few more, why an user should have to use sub menus while all the used 8 items could be fit nicely in the screen?

 

[infinite.loop]

If end users could create the hierarcy for the plugins it would be solving the need for any external "menu editors". What the end user would have to be able to do is:

1) specify top level categories (movies, music, tv...)
2) specify does plugin (or command / anything that you can bind in MP2 to home menu) belong to root or child level

+1
I proposed exactly that many years ago.

 

[offbyone]

I want to revive this thread with a more concrete plan:

1. There shall only be one screen that acts as Home or Root.
2. The Home screen shall act as information summary of your MP2 system instead of a main menu.
3. Any plugin may add a widget to the Home screen - the User can decide which show
   • News widget show couple of latest headline
   • Weather widget shows today's and tomorrow's weather
   • TV widget shows latest and current recordings
   • Media wigdet shows latest added movies, tv shows, pictures
   • ... stock prices, HDD space, latest YouTube videos, soccer scores, ...
4. What we know as the Menu shall be invoked by a "menu" button and display as overlay (graying out the background) and shall be available at any screen

Opinions?

 

[chefkoch]

We had lately another thread were the idea was raised to be more set-top-box like:
https://forum.team-mediaportal.com/threads/new-plugin-skin-concept.117438/

• Start in FullscreenTV without any menu
  • Could be configurable to be a video file, by default we could include an MP2 introduction or promotion video @Lyfesaver74
• menu can be opened from any place
• pressing back hides the menu -> goes to fullscreen,
  instead of leaving fullscreen and opening menu

Your idea regarding the widgets is nice, but most likely depends on the skin, doesn't it? Since the plugins provide the properties and content within their models already, the skins have to reuse them within their home/infoscreen.

Does the skin has to provide the settings which widgets are available on infoscreen or does is this defined by the plugin?

 

[offbyone]

I want the widgets to be explicit - with their own model and UI. The user should be able to configure what widget he want on the home screen. Every plugin can provide any number of widgets. I do not want it like in MP1 where the skin designer has to add each plugin's feature to the home screen. The other way around: a plugin contributes UI to the home screen, and the user configures if he wants it.

 

[wizard123]

Designers need a way of customising the design of the widgets to fit with their skin though or are you aiming for a single skin which you can then add the widgets to which have their own design ?

 

[offbyone]

In MP2 only the Data is provided by the code - the plugin dev cannot even dictate the controls - and everything about how you want it to look is up to the skin designer ;-)
So every widget has a so called Workflow Model providing data and what the UI does with that data is up to the skin designer.
This is done by matching a xaml template to the type of model. The default will be used when a skin does not provide its own as fallback.

 

[wizard123]

Sounds good the only thing i really really want at the moment is a step by step skinning guide for MP2. I can get my psd into blend but anything after that is a mystery even following the bits that Morpheus has posted in a separate thread, coming from MP1 the skinning seems so much more complicated even though it probably is not .