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Drag and Drop Addon, Finally
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sl23
- Posts: 1140
- Joined: February 17th, 2011, 7:45 pm
- Location: a Galaxy S7 far far away
Re: Drag and Drop Addon, Finally
i was just curious, but are there any plans for rainmeter to have a drag n drop interface or gui? Or is rainmeter destined to remain ini based?
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jsmorley
- Developer
- Posts: 22629
- Joined: April 19th, 2009, 11:02 pm
- Location: Fort Hunt, Virginia, USA
Re: Drag and Drop Addon, Finally
Rainmeter just does not lend itself to a drag and drop interface to create or edit skins. This has been talked about repeatedly over the years, but we are just not interested in losing the flexibility and power that Rainmeter has today for the sake of trying to make skin creation "user friendly".
It's a long discussion that you can probably find by searching around in the forums, but the long and the short of it is that even a Manhattan Project level of effort on some kind of skin creation GUI would end up as just a crippled and disappointing way to make simple "cookie cutter" skins, and not something we are even remotely interested in.
To be honest, while just "using" Rainmeter skins is pretty straightforward and driven by a GUI (Manage) and easy to understand context menus, creating and editing skins is something that takes a little commitment. It's not rocket science, and as "programming" goes is actually very easy and straightforward, but it's not for everyone. We understand that, and are really pretty ok with it. The payoff if you spend a couple of days learning the basics is enormous. Rainmeter has often been called "addictive".
A guitar and a radio both make music. Rainmeter is a guitar, and we have no desire to make a radio version of it.
It's a long discussion that you can probably find by searching around in the forums, but the long and the short of it is that even a Manhattan Project level of effort on some kind of skin creation GUI would end up as just a crippled and disappointing way to make simple "cookie cutter" skins, and not something we are even remotely interested in.
To be honest, while just "using" Rainmeter skins is pretty straightforward and driven by a GUI (Manage) and easy to understand context menus, creating and editing skins is something that takes a little commitment. It's not rocket science, and as "programming" goes is actually very easy and straightforward, but it's not for everyone. We understand that, and are really pretty ok with it. The payoff if you spend a couple of days learning the basics is enormous. Rainmeter has often been called "addictive".
A guitar and a radio both make music. Rainmeter is a guitar, and we have no desire to make a radio version of it.
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sl23
- Posts: 1140
- Joined: February 17th, 2011, 7:45 pm
- Location: a Galaxy S7 far far away
Re: Drag and Drop Addon, Finally
I did think it may lose versatility but thought maybe it was just too much work to make a GUI for it.
I have to say, I agree, RM can be addictive and is great to play about with. It's just there are a lot of things that I find too difficult to get to grips with. Formulas and RegExp are a start. For instance when trying to figure out the removable drives, I didn't have a clue where to start! RegExp looks like a complete language on its own. But even if I'd spent time learning it, I'd have been wasting my time as I didn't need to go down that route!
It's a shame something like RainPad isn't available with more stuff built in. I realise this is what you wanted to avoid, but most stuff is actually "cookie cutter" stuff. Then gets adapted to suit your needs. That's how I started to learn using RM. I looked at what the o/p of Rainpad was and studied each line to figure it out. But this is basic stuff, I know, but good for beginners. But once you get past beginner, as with many things, where do you go?
I've found the manual has helped in certain situations but is very limited as it doesn't actually explain, how or where certain things should be used. Often I've been told use this or that line to do something and I'm left thinking, well, where does it go?
I have to say, I agree, RM can be addictive and is great to play about with. It's just there are a lot of things that I find too difficult to get to grips with. Formulas and RegExp are a start. For instance when trying to figure out the removable drives, I didn't have a clue where to start! RegExp looks like a complete language on its own. But even if I'd spent time learning it, I'd have been wasting my time as I didn't need to go down that route!
It's a shame something like RainPad isn't available with more stuff built in. I realise this is what you wanted to avoid, but most stuff is actually "cookie cutter" stuff. Then gets adapted to suit your needs. That's how I started to learn using RM. I looked at what the o/p of Rainpad was and studied each line to figure it out. But this is basic stuff, I know, but good for beginners. But once you get past beginner, as with many things, where do you go?
I've found the manual has helped in certain situations but is very limited as it doesn't actually explain, how or where certain things should be used. Often I've been told use this or that line to do something and I'm left thinking, well, where does it go?
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