[Merkaartor] Some interface notes

Chris Browet cbro at semperpax.com
Sun Jan 11 01:05:53 GMT 2009


Hi Hugh,

Thanks for your comments.


> * this one has been mentioned since I first observed it. Large
> relations (coverage-wise) are almost impossible to work with using the
> interface. Further, simply selecting a relation with many members seems
> slow. Thankfully, it's already been well described, so my contribution
> is a suggestion for an alternate interface: how about
> parallel/redundant text-based controls? One could allow selection by
> ID. Just in case I'm having trouble selecting any object, why not allow
> me to input its ID? [1] Another control or menu item could be visible
> on the selection of an object. It would allow users to add the selected
> object(s) to the specified relation ID (a picklist of recently edited
> relations with their names could be provided to aid recall).


Please open a ticket for this one.

>
> * I think the task labels "download" and "download more" could be
> rethought. They confused me at first and I suspect confuse most
> newbies. Maybe something like "fetch area" and "reveal more data"? They
> suck, too, but they have the right meaning. "Change viewport" and
> "Retrieve viewport data"??


What about "Download current viewport"?

>
>
> * further on that, I use "download more", more frequently than
> "download", but it has a more difficult keyboard shortcut (^-Shift-D
> vs ^-d). It's a problem to change the interface like this suddenly, but
> can we think about how to address this over time?


There is a shortcut editor to avoid discussions about the pertinence of
shortcuts. Changing such an often used one could disturb some.
Obviously, if there is a consensus, I don't mind...

>
>
> * the column widths in the tag editing control can be resized but don't
> stick. That would be nice if they would.


Mmm... They do stick since a couple of weeks. Don't they? Well, I mean the
first column stick. The second just takes whatever remaining space
available.

>
>
> * if I have object(s) selected, I lose this when I use "download more"


You mean you lose the selection? Please open a ticket...

>
>
> * it would also be nice to select multiple rows in the tag data control
> and delete them. It seems to me I have to select and delete each
> key/value pair separately. This is something I often have to do with
> GPX waypoints that I make into proper OSM nodes. There
> might also be other operations users want to do with multiple tags.


Ticket, please ;-)

>
>
> * when I get 412 Precondition Failed (etc., perhaps other API errors),
> can I find out more specific info? For example: which object caused the
> API error? which objects have been affected (because usually my upload
> partially succeeds)? It seems the API doesn't supply this level
> of help, though, so maybe that's a request for the API to provide richer
> feedback.


Yep, the 412 is returned from the API and we cannot know (AFAIK) what caused
it.

>
>
> * when I change the role of members in the tag data cells for
> relations, the change does not seem to show in the cell until it's
> scrolled. Some little glitch in the UI.
>
> * data cells for relation members do not behave the same way as data
> cells for object tags when I use the TAB key. When I am in the last
> column of the tagging data cell row, I can tab to the next row. I
> cannot do this for relation members.


Ticket, please ;-)  You can merge the last 2 points, as the general problem
is that some of the enhancements made to the tag list probably didn't make
it to the relation member list.

>
> - Chris -
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