Parts manager poll and opinions

[cocoscacao]

State your opinions

[JoeSchmuckatelli]

I think this poll is too binary.  I don't want it to be the default.  I'd like to retain the feature as something I can open by clicking the Parts Manager Icon at the bottom of the screen... but not by right clicking on a specific part.

When I right click - I want a small panel just for that particular part to open - so I can have a couple of specific parts up in small windows like before.

With GREATLY reduced font and window size.

 

[cocoscacao]

Use too early to tell option, if you have some improvement ideas (and share them here). I agree that label could have gotten a more descriptive text

[whatsEJstandfor]

Nay in its current form. imho if they could make it much more compact, combine it with the Resource Mangler, and make it reliably take less than a second to load for even huge crafts, I'll be on board. As it is now, I get no utility from it at all.

[Chilkoot]

14 minutes ago, JoeSchmuckatelli said:

With GREATLY reduced font and window size.

And also a readable font without insanity kerning.  The UI art direction feels like a 90's WinAmp skin lol.

EDIT:  Also the VAB and Flight UI's feel like they are at war with each other.  Flight UI has some microscopic elements hardly readable on a 27" monitor, while the VAB interface feels like it was made for a TV across the room (and controller-friendly, too).  Design teams really need to have a coffee and come to some kind of agreement.

Edited March 13, 2023 by Chilkoot

[cocoscacao]

There is a lot of useless clutter in it. Batteries, fuel tanks, static structural parts, basically anything that doesn't have some sort of state user can change (toggle antenna, lights, deploy fairing etc). It is a nice idea, if you for example ALT + click on several parts, you get their info in a confined space, instead all over the screen like in ksp 1. Maybe not remove it completely, but re-purpose it...

[mcwaffles2003]

I like the idea of not having to select each and every individual part and having 30 pinned windows on my screen. It's got work to go but it's definitely a better solution. 

Maybe include tabs instead of just a >

Edited March 13, 2023 by mcwaffles2003

[bigyihsuan]

I like having a master parts list, but I prefer the right-click tweakable menus from KSP1 better. You click on a part, and a small menu pops up, versus the gigantic parts manager.

The parts manager definitely needs some better way of filtering parts, it shows all the parts in the craft currently.

[silent_prtoagonist]

I'd like to see KSP 1 style, per-part context menus as the default behavior, with the all-in-one parts manager as an alternative launched from the app bar. 

[RocketRockington]

I think the Parts Manager is there in its current form only because its a more console-friendly UI.  For PC, it's just awful by itself.  In addition to part menus, it would be ok - but not as the primary way to access the functionality on a part.

[Guest]

It's nice in practice sometimes but I may also want to check a certain single part and waiting for all the other parts on a big craft to load into the menu is a pain. I wish it were contextually mind-reading so when I want to configure five SAS modules at one time it's easy, but when I want to check engine info in flight it doesn't freeze the game to load everything else...

[VlonaldKerman]

I think the best way would be to have a KSP 1-style window open up when you right click a part, with the parts manager also as an option. There are definitely times when I've found the parts manager useful, but plenty of other times when I just want the options for one part to pop up, especially during flight.

Another exacerbating factor, in my opinion, is the font and other stylistic choices made in the part manager. I think that it could be done with a cleaner, sleeker look, and with smaller font. One big issue with it is that when you're scrolling through, so few items appear on the screen at one time, that it's hard to tell which direction you're scrolling and it's just in general disorienting. If each of the little dropdowns were smaller so more would fit on the screen at once, the visual feedback of the scrolling causing the list to move in a given direction would be much clearer, and the whole thing less disorienting and more user-friendly.

In general I think this is a pattern with the UI- the less big and blocky it is, the better it is to look at, and the more functional it is, and the more responsive it feels.

[cocoscacao]

1 hour ago, regex said:

but when I want to check engine info in flight it doesn't freeze the game to load everything else

That load time is kinda suspicious... I'm thinking it has more to do with UI rendering optimisations than loading data. A json of 1000 objects is negligible even for a potato PC.

[Guest]

4 minutes ago, cocoscacao said:

That load time is kinda suspicious... I'm thinking it has more to do with UI rendering optimisations than loading data. A json of 1000 objects is negligible even for a potato PC.

Have you tried right-clicking on a part in flight with a craft having more than 50 parts? I honestly don't care what's causing it, it's a big drawback of the system.

[cocoscacao]

@regex No. But 20+ parts craft in the VAB is causing about 100 millisecond hiccup for me (Ryzen 9 5900X / RX 6700), so I can feel your pain. We really need some perf-nerfs.

Edited March 14, 2023 by cocoscacao

[Turbo Ben]

Nay from me, for the most part. I'd prefer it to bring up the options for the part I right click on, like KSP 1. An additional button in the options to expand to a full parts list might be helpful though. My thinking is, if I click a part I want the options for that part. Sometimes it's hard to pick out the part you want, such as small or hidden parts, or if the craft is spinning wildly out of control (which never, ever happens to me of course).

[Klapaucius]

4 hours ago, VlonaldKerman said:

I think that it could be done with a cleaner, sleeker look, and with smaller font.

I have to disagree with this.   For those of us with older eyes, smaller fonts will just make things worse.  Perhaps that could be in the settings, but I'd want to at least have the option of larger text.

[Haustvindr]

Didn't get to try it, but reading the media and checking your captures/videos... I think one of the best UX I can think of would be:

• right click -> open part manager
• in part manager, drag the title of a part to create a floating window only for that part, drag it wherever you want it to be
• said part would dissapear completely from the part manager while its window is open (or leaving it as a greyed-out title) 
  • if left as a greyed-out title, double click would expand it in the part manager, no matter if there is already an independent window open somewhere
• alt + right click on any part -> open independent window directly (don't know if this conflicts with something already in the game)

For console users in the future:

• the part manager opens a little more in the center of the screen
• when you command a part to have independent windows, they would auto-organize themselves in the right side playing area (between part manager and stages)
• for console users, this would be a fixed list with scrolling, so most probably needs a way to reorder the independent parts so you have what you want inside the screen and not hidden by the scroll

Either way, this is a rough idea I've been rumiating based on what I'm seeing, when I can actually test it I might make a mockup as a suggestion. Wish me luck this thursday!

[Brofessional]

The KSP1 style PAW is much better, but the new parts manager window should stay as a secondary option opened from the toolbar.

[pandaman]

I'm in the 'Not a bad idea, but needs refinements' camp.

If right clicking a part opened only the relevant section, with a button to open the full menu focused on the clicked part it would help a lot.  

The option to open the full, unfocucused, menu from the icon at the bottom is still useful though.

It is certainly way too big for me, but may be fine for other users.  Scalability is the key here.  But I guess that's partly what this EA thing us about.

[LoSBoL]

13 minutes ago, pandaman said:

Scalability is the key here.

The menus are scalable, it currently does not remember its previous state after you close them. 

[Sea_Kerman]

One issue is the top and bottom margins are way too thick, you could cut the vertical size nearly in half.

 ———

[Fullmetal Analyst]

the parts manager might be useful if it didnt freeze the game for a few seconds every time i right-click something

[pandaman]

29 minutes ago, LoSBoL said:

The menus are scalable, it currently does not remember its previous state after you close them. 

I found how to re-size them with the tab on the bottom  right corner.

But they would also benefit (along with the other UI elements) from being able to scale the font etc to get more info in the same or smaller space.   A minor thing in the grand scheme of things.  But it would enable the user to tailor things to suit their own preferences.

[LoSBoL]

4 minutes ago, pandaman said:

I found how to re-size them with the tab on the bottom  right corner.

But they would also benefit (along with the other UI elements) from being able to scale the font etc to get more info in the same or smaller space.   A minor thing in the grand scheme of things.  But it would enable the user to tailor things to suit their own preferences.

Ah, I mixed up scalable and re-sizeable. Yes, you are right, scaling would be preferable to please everybody. 

Edited March 14, 2023 by LoSBoL