UI for "Transform Pivot Point" Dropdown

Blender Development
#1

Hi friends! New developer here, apologies if anything about this post was handled poorly.

I was investigating why changing the pivot point via the dropdown in the 3D Viewport header would show as an “Unknown Action” in the undo history. I found that I could resolve this issue by changing the dropdown’s UI to a popover menu (screenshot below). This also had the side-effect of making the dropdown look more consistent with the other dropdowns that surround it in the header. To me, this seems like a win-win. However, I have a few questions:

  1. Since this is a pretty small change, should I go ahead and submit my code for review? Or should I run this past the UI module team in blender.chat before doing so? I’d like to be respectful, but also not bother them with what seems like a small change.
  2. While working on this, I noticed some other inconsistencies between menu layouts. For example, the 3D Viewport’s proportional editing falloff menu uses a popover menu, while the Graph Editor’s proportional editing falloff menu uses a select menu. Is there an open task or project for cleaning up these inconsistencies? Or has the UI team provided a general direction on which types of menus should be used where? (This is probably not at the top of their priority list, but figured I’d ask anyway!)

Thank you for your time!

image

7 Likes
#2

Hey Chris!

Since this is a pretty small change, should I go ahead and submit my code for review?

Yes, and just select “User Interface” as Reviewer. This seems reasonable at first glance but needs to be submitted to get a proper review. Include lots of details and justification like you have done here and including this same capture helps too. But be patient as it can take a while at times.

UI team provided a general direction on which types of menus should be used where?

Consistency is desired, and in general popovers are preferred now. I’d guess the only real reason that Transform Pivot Point is like it is because the others are more complex and needed converting first. This one was just waiting for you.

1 Like
#3

Thank you very much, Harley! This is incredibly helpful. I’ll take your advice!

#4

I am not sure about that. From a user’s point of view, popover is worst for this one.
Menus are allowing to use shortcuts for items. Popovers are not.
But there is a pie-menu corresponding to Proportional Editing Falloff. So, people are probably using it.

Kept menus have a title exposed.
It looks like Name was lost in Proportional Editing Falloff popover of 3D View.

1 Like
#5

That’s why it is nice to get something like this into the review process. This way you can try it yourself (if you compile) and add specific and targeted comments here: https://developer.blender.org/D11121

1 Like