Re: When a photographer uses eog -- some observations

Hello everybody

As there was zero response to my email some days ago, which I spent some 
time putting together, I just want to ask why: Should I better file 
bugs/feature requests or not put all in one email or you did not like 
the style or only developer-discussions on this list or ...?

I did not expect somebody to discuss each and every point, but I thought 
to get some reaction. As I am interested to help making eog better, if 
only from a user perspective, it would help to know why my email was 
obviously in vain.

Thanks for a line or two,
Marcus




DigiSus wrote:
> Dear developers
> 
>  From a recent photo weekend workshop I needed to browse, select, delete 
> and sort >2000 photos. I thought it might be interesting to developers 
> to learn about my experiences when doing this with eog 2.22.2 (ubuntu 
> Hardy Heron).
> 
> First of all, it is possible to handle large amounts of photos with eog. 
> :-)
> 
> But some tasks could be more efficient and some tasks are not (yet) 
> possible. My observations are strictly from an end-user point of view as 
> I am a hardcore user and not a developer. Sorry, the email got so long 
> and thanks for bearing with me. :-)
> 
> 
> 1) The ever-recurring task is to look at each photo (in fullscreen, 
> sometimes 1:1 view) in a folder and decide about deleting it or moving 
> it to another folder. Currently, eog provides only the deleting option 
> with an irritating confirmation question:
> - A preference tick box to suppress the confirmation question after 
> deletion would save a click with each deletion. That is many clicks. ;-)
> - Two ideas for implementing a sorting possibility: Either (a) let 
> photos be marked (with 'M') and when user leaves F11 mode, s/he can move 
> all marked photos to a specified folder. Or, (b) allow drag&drop from 
> the collection pane to move a photo into another folder.
> (Now, I delete the photos and get them out of the trash can afterwards 
> and put them into separate folder. It is an ugly workaround to be able 
> to stay in F11 mode all the time and save 3x as many clicks...)
> 
> 2) Going to next/prev image. I read that the mouse wheel for going 
> next/prev was removed, but I do not know why and whether it is possible 
> to get it back. It would be very helpful.
> 
> Another elegant and visually appealing way could be: When the mouse 
> touches the right or left border of the screen (in F11 mode), the 
> next/prev photo is shown.
> 
> 3) In F11 mode, I can zoom in/out of a photo or see it in 1:1 or 
> windows-fit size. Unfortunately, this setting is not remembered when I 
> go the next/prev photo. So, I have to zoom again... Maybe, make it a 
> preference tickbox to remember zoom setting or not.
> 
> 4) The image collection pane and EXIF information are essential features 
> for this work and I am glad eog provides them. But the properties/EXIF 
> window takes too muich screen space which I need for the image. And it 
> is overloaded/confusing. Could something similar to the Ctrl-i feature 
> from gthumbs be implemented that shows the image/EXIF information in a 
> small box -while- in F11 mode? I put the properties button in the icon 
> bar but it does not show during F11. This way, I see no way to see EXIF 
> data during F11 mode...?
> 
> 5) As to the EXIF information itself: There is no need to write down all 
> the words "aperture value", "exposure time", etc. because the values 
> (f/3.2 or 1/125) speak for themselves.
> 
> Here is a use case proposal to think about: When the user presses "i" in 
> F11 mode, a small semi-transparent box with two lines of text should 
> appear (and stay with subsequent photos) showing image information. In 
> preferences, the user can select how much information should be shown: 1 
> or 2 lines. Pressing "i" again switches off the info box.
> 
> Example:
> 
> (1st line)
> P416724.jpg - (13/437) - 2736x3648 pixels - 3.2MB
> (2nd line, optional)
> f/5.6 - 1/250s - 85mm - ISO 100 - 05.07.2008 17:13
> 
> BTW: The value currently given as "Focal length" is not what 
> photographers expect to see. They need the value in [mm] given under 
> Details|Camera|FocalLenghtIn35mmFilm.
> 
> 6) Judging photos has a lot to do with aestethics. It would be helpful 
> if eog would support that by being in the background as much as possible.
> Good start: In F11 mode, the background around the photo is black. But 
> the image collection bar is system grey as is the top icon bar.
> - Could the pane have black background as well around the thumbnails, so 
> that only the thumbnails are visible?
> - Could a small/middle/big sizing of thumbnails made in the preferences?
> 
> 7) Often, adjacent photos need to be compared. Could a 2-up or even 4-up 
> view in F11 mode be implemented that show 2 simultanesouly next to each 
> other or even 4 in the four quadrants of the screen? (Next/prev would 
> then mean moving 2 or 4 photos at once.)
> 
> 8) Having a GUI preference to choose where the collection pane should be 
> shown (bottom top left right) would be helpful. For example, sometimes 
> the pane makes sense to be at the bottom, but sometimes more efficient 
> use of the screen space for the photo makes sense and then the pane 
> should be vertical on one side.
> 
> 9) The last two are not crucial but may win over many people who work 
> visually:
> 
> 9a) Could we have a smoother scrolling in the image collection pane? 
> Perhaps it could be done with the mouse hovering over the pane? Moving 
> far to the right scrolls fast forward, more to the middle scrolls 
> slower. (think iPod scrolling...)
> 
> 9b) slideshow. To have it look professional (e.g., when showing photos 
> to a larger audience with music in the background, etc.) it would be 
> nice to have fading between the photos, in 3 variants: Fade via black, 
> fade via white, fade directly into next photo.
> 
> Alright, I thank you for reading all this and I hope this feedback is 
> useful to you. I would be glad to help with further input/feedback/spec 
> if needed or if you have questions to what I wrote...
> 
> Thanks & best regards,
> Marcus
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