"Foldaway" Combo Pages: Save Space, Add Convenience!

This idea dawned on me and a few others during a particularly active evening in #ZCTesters on initialized. (Show up if you want Hawt ZC Action!) .... (*lol*) But seriously, it seems that this idea has sparked quite a bit of support upon its release into the channel. Check it out.

... This is so unnecessarily long. :sweat: I apologize for that. But it's for the best to fully realize this suggestion's potential.

Okay, we've all seen Dungeon Carving and Isometric Mode. We all agree that they're absolutely astounding features. However, many people are concerned that they'll severely mess up the combo pages, what with reorganizing things like floor borders and dungeon walls.

Well here's where this idea comes in.

In order to avoid this hassle of having to reconfigure the combo page, and then have it all in a jumble, and having to click on the upper left corner of that series of 4x10+ whatever combos in the combo page, perhaps we could have a method where we only had -ONE- combo with which to draw with?

For example, .. hmm .. what's a good method. Okay, I suppose it's like, ... spraypainting versus bugspraying. From the spraycan, you're lugging around the whole can with you wherever you're spraypainting. But with the bug canister, you've got he canister clean out of sight behind you somewhere, with a nice, long hose to simply point and shoot at your target.

That's what I'm talking about. If we could "fold away" the unnecessary combos, out of sight, out of mind, then we would have but a single combo with which to look at, click on, and draw. I mean, MY GOD, imagine having 1) Walls, upper and lower, 2) Floor Borders 3) Water 4) Other Terrain, .. to draw with, .. and imagine how many combos those would take up with Isometric / Dungeon carving mode!

Now imagine if you could just fold away those unnecessary combos that you'll never use, and all of those combos, would suddenly turn into *Gasp* ... Only ... Four .. Combos! O_O You could simplify your dungeon by such a significant amount.



Alright, so here's how it would work. Go to the Combo Page. highlight a series of combos. Right-Click, and select "Collapse" In this combo page editor ONLY, that combo would have a permanent, flashing hue to it, which symbolizes that there are combos behind it, with that flashinig combo as the first of that series. So, if you were to highlight-->Collapse a full series of floor borders for isometric mode, all you would see of that whole series, is one combo.

In the main ZQuest screen, you'll view the combo page collapsed, as if those combos weren't there. There's no flashing icon, and it acts like a regular combo while not in Isometric mode, and you'd simply draw with it as you would any other 1x1 combo.

When you enter Isometric mode, though, even though while it doesn't visibly have any trailing combos in the system, and is just laying there, a 1x1 combo intermixed with a whole series of unrelated ones, and yet it draws like the main combo of an isometric combo group's main point.

Imagine having four such combos in a row. Imagine by how much you could reduce your entire combo page. You could reduce the Normal dungeon, cryptic dungeon, ice dungeon, Ganon's dungeon, and special dungeon, all into five combos, plus four more for four different kinds of floor borders, and one or two more for water combos.

:odd:

:drool:

I support this idea. It would make organization so much easier.

I also express support for this idea. I could think of ways to use it already. Just make sure they can be unfolded as well, so that you may pick specific combos when necessary. :D

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Originally Posted by bigjoe

I also express support for this idea. I could think of ways to use it already. Just make sure they can be unfolded as well, so that you may pick specific combos when necessary. :D

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Heh. This comes with its own simplicity flag. I mean, once you "compress" it, it adds that "flashing" quality to that on the combo page. To uncompress it, it'd simply look for that flashing flag, and if it has one, it'll decompress it or something. Fairly simple.

It's finding ROOM for all those combos, that's the problem.

How about this? A modern ZQuest GUI with dockable floating tool windows with roll-up functionality, with combos and aliases on tabs for quick switching, and customizable collections letting you create a "page" for bushes, one for wall, another for blocks, etc....

maybe even a "recently used combos" sort of list to keep much used ones handy.

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Originally Posted by fatcatfan

How about this? A modern ZQuest GUI with dockable floating tool windows with roll-up functionality, with combos and aliases on tabs for quick switching, and customizable collections letting you create a "page" for bushes, one for wall, another for blocks, etc....

maybe even a "recently used combos" sort of list to keep much used ones handy.

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Ah, well, part of the reason for this suggestion, is that people dislike clutter. How ironic.

Though that's a wonderful idea as well. :) Heck, you can even design it for each area that you're building. That would be so incredibly helpful! :o

It would be like an Artist's Palette as he's painting. You've got all your frequently used colors within easy and constant reach. Once you set them up, that is. ;)

I get your idea, you want to be able to fold away a selection of combos to temporarily get them out of the way. If you can create you own collections sorted and filtered independent of the numerical order of combos, you can arrange them to eliminate what you don't need in a similar fashion.

FYI, I'm working on the new ZQuest, so you designer interface suggestions are welcome. What will make quest designing easier for you, streamline the process?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by fatcatfan

I get your idea, you want to be able to fold away a selection of combos to temporarily get them out of the way. If you can create you own collections sorted and filtered independent of the numerical order of combos, you can arrange them to eliminate what you don't need in a similar fashion.

FYI, I'm working on the new ZQuest, so you designer interface suggestions are welcome. What will make quest designing easier for you, streamline the process?

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I know that you understand, but I'm vain like that. Many apologies. Your ambition for an infinitely more efficient ZQuest is admirable at least, (Imagine what it is at most. *lol* ) But I'd recommend starting at the bottom and seeing what negative parts can be eliminated, actually. Since we've been pretty much working with the same interface since the beginning, it'd be sort of like asking two legged people what they'd like to change about their method of manual bodily locomotion. Very few people will actually have an answer. :p At least not at first.


Let's see, what's annoying about it.

1) No Bookmarks for Combo Pages. Easily remedied by these "pullout combo portions" but first, you have to get there. Perhaps assigning a hotkey to a specific combo would be useful?

2) Same for maps.

3) Having one of those "ZQuest Notepads" would be nice, possibly under the Etc menu, for jotting down notes. Even though you could just as easily alt-tab to work in a notepad document, you know it'd be far, far more simplistic to work with it this way. I think Mottzilla recommended this earlier on. It really would be wonderful. Free space for remembering things, hey, how can you lose! :p

Tiles page seems ideal. We already have page-zoom-to's. But that's ONLY involving the tiles pages.