SW08 UI customisation - Matt Writes articles removed?

Matt had a major meltdown on his blog site. I thought he said that he got the old articles up again, but not people's comments. Perhaps he didn't get that article up again. It doesn't appear that Matt is toeing anybody's line.

I don't have any good words to say about the new user interface, but I haven't spend much time trying to set it up to my liking. I have been resisting the temptation to turn it into a near-clone of my old interface, since other people whose opinions I trust say to give it a chance.

Jerry Steiger

I am in the camp of "I like the new UI, for the most part."

That being said, here are the reasons. (I don't do swoopy stuff so I can't talk to that part of it if it's different.) The new UI has made me faster because of less mouse travel and fewer mouse clicks overall. I use a lot of hotkeys, and the combination of my standard ones, the new S shortcut bar, and the flyout context menus, I almost never go to the menus at the top - only on rare occasion do I need to fly them out. Yes, I have them hidden and only fly out when needed.

When I first started the SW2008 beta testing and tried the new UI, my first question was "Where's my stuff??" And that's the first question from people here. But with one gentleman that doesn't appreciate change, once I spent

20 minutes with him to show him that most of his stuff was at the cursor, by the end of the day he liked it. I have customized the shortcuts to the way we do stuff and find that expecially in a sketch, just about everything is available at the cursor.

So, if you are willing to give some credit to the folks at SW in that they did actually think about the overall user experience, then it's worth a bit of time to give a good try to learning what they changed and why. I had the opportunity to talk with some of them about it and I can tell you that they do consider the effect on the user. I won't say there aren't any bad decisions, because there are some I don't agree with. But for the most part, things were done with the purpose of speeding up the user.

If you wish to try my settings as a starter, let me know and I will send you my file. It's a good way to start with the way we are using it, look at what we changed and why, and then decide what you like or dislike.

WT

ok I didnt know about the melt down - strange the only articles missing appear to be the more critical ones about the UI though...

I havent installed 08 yet - going to wait for sp5 - but my first instinct is to redecorate with all the toolbars I have had for previous installs. I have always just liked having everything in immediate view rather than hunting through menus you know...

...so on your recommendation guys ;o) I'll give the std layout a try for a while and see if it isnt as bad as I expect...gotta admit I'm not very enthusiastic about it at all though.. :o(

thanks Neil

thanks Wayne, may well take you up on the offer come install time (sp5)

The prospect of visiting the menus repeatedly doesnt thrill me in the least.

Interesting to note you have been able to circumvent ribbon rage with hotkeys and shortcut customisation. Was this (hotkeys) the way you worked previously or have you found this talent for 08? I have pretty much just used icons/mouse clicks.

Neil

I have always used hotkeys as it's a guaranteed speed increase. We once had a user here that said he knew where all his icons were and challenged me to a contest. Sure, it was a no-brainer for me as how can you possibly accellerate the mouse toward an icon, decellerate, and click, faster than I can press a key that is already under my finger? No way.

With the new S hotkey and the new context toolbars that both come up at the cursor, I only have one toolbar up all the time and that's my macros. I suppose I could assign all those to hotkeys, but they aren't used enough to warrant that. I contend that to really improve your speed with SW, you have to be willing to learn why they did what they did and really give it a chance and intend to learn it. That means not pinning the menus out and not just loading all the old toolbars. Try to understand the new methods and how to use them to become faster.

Yes, I would be happy to talk you through the "Where's my stuff?" :-)

WT

Wayne,

I too am a hotkey use,. but still on SW2007. Could you explain what the S hotkey is?

Aaron R. Friedman ARF Designs

Wayne Tiffany wrote:

In 2008 they added a pop up menu when you hit the S key. It's got commands on it based on what type of file you have open and is customizable as well. Sort of like a command manager but based on what you're currently working on and pops up in the graphics window where your cursor is at. It saves on mouse movements if you remember to use it!

Aar> Wayne,

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Wayne, I'll take you up on that offer!

Jerry Steiger jerrys at tdsway dot com

What's old is new again....

Chris

** Posted from **

Done. Sorry I am so late - I was at a COSMOS seminar today and then just finished cleaning up from our user group meeting. What a great day!

WT

...snip I contend that to really improve your speed with SW, you have

Therein lies the rub. Re-learning what they changed every year or not getting your money's worth. If I didn't ask for it I'm probably going to have to be sold on it. And I'm not real keen on relearning till I know what works and what doesn't.

TOP

Fair enough - makes for a tough decision.

WT

You don't need to complain about being late; I still haven't tried it out! I need to refresh myself on editing the registry.

Jerry

You don't edit the registry - you use the Copy Settings Wizard. The file I sent you was the SW file. Just unzip it somewhere, start the Wizard and choose to Restore settings. It will offer to nake a backup of yours in case you want to go back, and that's a good idea. If you import everything of mine, it will change locations to the macros, blocks, etc.

WT

So, can you change what key pops up the shortcut bar, or are you stuck with 'S'?

Aar> In 2008 they added a pop up menu when you hit the S key. It's got

You should be able to change it as it's assigned in the UI for the shortcuts. However, since it's a SW default that will be on basically every machine, I would suggest renaming and relearning whatever you currently have assigned to S. We had Sketch assigned to the S key, and I felt it was important enough to learn the new S key that I reassigned the Sketch to Alt-S.

WT

That's interesting-I did the exact same thing-great minds and all that.

Working by myself has posed challenges for me in learning the new interface. I find myself asking basic questions in the forums because I dislike my VAR and don't feel I can count on them for help.

Then as far as `s' key goes-it took me some time to figure out how it worked. Then there's the issue of taking the time to customize it for each different environment. That is, there will be different choices in sketch mode, part mode, assembly, etc. It's still a work in progress in this regard. I am beginning to see the advantages, but I am only willing to say that it's more just different than better. I was pretty fast before and re-learning has made me slower for a time. I can't get over the feeling that there were lots of long-standing bugs that could have been addressed with the resources that were used to develop the new interface.

just MHO.

jk