Improve "new composer" Look & Feel

iguerra · ‎Feb 28, 2020

I switched from TWX 8.2 to 8.5

I have now to use the new composer to work with the platform / mashup, I'm using it since a week.

I see that this is faster, quicker, and some feature are much better managed (expressions, validators... services develop phase with direct save and run...)

However the page style (for me) is more confusing than the old, in particular

when working with mashups, on the right side the panel for working with Data/Session/User is manly ALL WHITE ... this is much worse than old composer where enties was black, services was red, return values was gray background and it was much faster "for eyes".
The height of all the "rows" of that panel but also widged properties, widget list, is too high.
This takes lot of space for the same informations compared to the old composer, could be smaller by 20 to 40% or more, and all of the same height.
The mashup explorer is instead very good.
with fast eye look, it is not immediately visible the mashup zone from the the panel/develop zone or toolbar (cut/paste...), the sections are not well separated with backgroud colors
When opening a thing, all related section "general info" "properties" "services" works like a TAB, keeping the thing open. But when clicking "permission" it will change the visualization and seems you are not still working on this thing. This is confusing. It should work like other sections keeping the thing open
The permission section is totally different from other "entity managemend section"
Generally when working with an object/entity its name is written BIG and on the top (the eye looks here after some time); but on this section it is written on the top "Permission | collections" or "Permission | entity" and not the selected entity/collection. The entity where you are working is written in a little box below.IMHO the entity name should be BIG on the top (like if it were a thing) something like "Things collection permission" [like old composer]
When you have multiple objects open, there are tabs on top with the entity names and symbol.
This tab, graphically, should show better which is the currently opened tab (little more contrast ?)

This is just some ideas and what I see "worse" compared to old composer that I used for years

(ok ... just my opinion ).

OldGoat · ‎Mar 06, 2020

We transitioned from 8.3.3 to 8.5.1 in December 2019. There are some new features in the new Composer that are very good. But 90% or more of the changes are horrible. Hard to use, hard to see, hard to navigate, hard to find things, in other words, many of the changes have made this otherwise great tool very difficult to work with. TOO MUCH WHITE SPACE...Go back and look and how it looked with 8.3.3. Make it look more like that. The color scheme also makes it difficult to read...too washed out, and the dividing lines are almost totally gone. Things jump around way too much when you mouse over or drag things. When I'm "wiring up" a parameter, I am targeting a specific spot on the screen, only to have it jump somewhere totally unexpected when I get close to the target! I can't tell you how many times I have either wired or unwired things incorrectly, then wasted more time debugging it. Mashup tabs are washed out so it is hard to tell which one is "ACTIVE", and they don't stay put when you save a change. When making a change, the tab jumps to the far left. The old version of Composer allowed you to drag tabs to the desired order, and then they STAYED PUT until I moved them again. I really need this back.

I have many other gripes with the new composer. If I had to give it an overall grade, I'd give it a D. I LOVE ThingWorx...but this new composer has done nothing to win me over

iguerra · ‎Mar 06, 2020

I absolutely agree... my list could become longer cause I used it for more days ...

I think TWX development already know about this, I think that without redesigning all that would take very very much time ... just with working 70% on style (colors , objects sizes etc.. ) and 30% on information positioning, could increase a lot develop_performance.

Just few additional little improvements ...

When using monitoring-> script ... the "filter by user" is hidden under the filtering icon and is not visible when applied, but on the right there is 80% of the screen compeltely white. Why use a filtering dropdown menu when the top section is almost all free ?
when selecting the output-type of a service, it's ok that the var_type can be written.... but the dropdown var_type list has rows height 3 times larger than needed, so it has to be scrolled 3-4 times with mouse
When switching from a opened mashup TAB (in edit mode) with another, it takes time to refresh ... in old composer it was instantaneous.
USEFUL. Possibility to create "folders" under the modeling groups (eg. things, templates ....) where I can move things (drag-drop) in stead to have them in one level . I could group libraries_things from machines_things or other functions as I prefer.
It would be nice like (already done!) have separated timers , schedulers [don't know however why repositories are groupes into the "Manage" section !?!]

Regards

cbaldwin · ‎Jul 09, 2020

Shared with the UX team for review.

olivierlp · ‎Aug 05, 2021

Will consider these for future release after a review with our UX team.

olivierlp · ‎Aug 05, 2021

Will consider these for future release after a review with our UX team.

olivierlp · ‎Oct 03, 2022

Hello,

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