FreeOrion

Hello,

I have a question about the UI. You start out in the fleeting view with the sitrep, pedia and the fleet control to the left.
I first of all pull sitrep, pedia and the fleet control completely to the left side and adjust them to fit.
Now if you switch to the production section a second pedia pops open in the upper left corner.
That is something I was confused about since I started playing the game.
I sort of ignored the popping up pedia at production since I couldn't turn it of, just pull it over to the right so I have my overlapping sitrep visible.
Recent changes invoked a different behaviour in these two pedia. Before I guess all calls went to the pedia at the left, at least I was working only with it.
Now in the production view calls about planet survivability go to the upper pedia and calls about info on planetary bonus go to the left side pedia.
Switching from production view to fleeting modus especially in end game takes some time. I thought maybe taking this pedia double out might speed up the game.
In the design view pedia is there as well, but in this case it adds in very well in the UI, all in it's place and in my opinion no need to adjust anything.
Why are there two pedias in the production view?
Is this always the same pedia with different window arrangements or are there redundant resources running?
How do you manage your UI and how do you make use of the extra pedia?
Is it possible to turn one of them off and would that speed up things?
If that would be true a different question would be, is it possible to put the whole production view (production list and producible items) in two additional windows, called together, that just hides like the objects window?

Scara wrote:Now if you switch to the production section a second pedia pops open in the upper left corner. [...] I sort of ignored the popping up pedia at production since I couldn't turn it of, [...]

I've recently implemented that the production screen's pedia can be closed, though it still needs some polishing.

Scara wrote:Recent changes invoked a different behaviour in these two pedia. Before I guess all calls went to the pedia at the left, at least I was working only with it. Now in the production view calls about planet survivability go to the upper pedia and calls about info on planetary bonus go to the left side pedia.

Correct, there's a PR which will fix it so that all calls will go to the production screen's pedia when the production screen is open. I think the previous behaviour was that the production window closed when you called up the pedia, which I usually found annoying.

Scara wrote:I thought maybe taking this pedia double out might speed up the game.

I'm not an expert on that, but I can't imagine it matters; also, taking out one of the pedias would be non-trivial.

Scara wrote:Why are there two pedias in the production view?

I had assumed the map window's pedia would close when the production screen is opened, I notice only now it doesn't; I think to close the map's pedia when the production screen is opened would be the desired behaviour, or would it not?

I would be interested to see how people arrange their production screen, and maybe get an idea how it could be fine-tuned some more. I arrange my PS like this:

Posted mine a couple times (1, 2 hopefully this works. I think one Pedia per screen should be enough, especially as it normally duplicates content.

As long as I can still see SitReps and Objects from within ProdWnd I'll be happy. (I can't test your PR immediately as compiling multiple forks on Linux is a non-trivial thing to learn to do)

I also think we need to think about the default locations for a fair few screens, especially ProdWnd layout and default SitRep position as they do work really well together.

Mine looks like this:

I think to close the map's pedia when the production screen is opened would be the desired behaviour, or would it not?

No, not the way I use the UI...

I think the previous behaviour was that the production window closed when you called up the pedia, which I usually found annoying.

Yeah, that was a bit strange and I think that was why I started to ignore the prod screen pedia, as it took its infos with it vanishing when exiting the production screen. So I never closed the map pedia as it stays in both modes and I had no problems with the production closing down on a question anymore . Approach a problem the other way around
I sort of haven't came up with a UI config I was really glad with and got used to the overlapping windows in production screen. I want all windows at once ! Ahhh, but it won't fit ... as I like to have a wide starfield view aswell... the UI as a nice frame!
Important other windows with production screen open are in this priority for me, sitrep, objects and pedia mostly for looking up species to colonize with.
On opening the Production screen it closes only Fleets. So best would be to find nice position for the other windows and just have both fleet and production windows switched in one position.
Only problem the production windows are much bigger together and need to be in my opinion.
The Production list together with producibles list could nicely be stacked to a column. I my early tries in finding a UI config I tried to get this column behind the planets view on the right, but that was fixed.
Maybe have it like that, with a nice sliding effect coming out from the right side of the planets pushing them out a bit ( just dreaming...), the left and lower side would be free for the other windows!

Thanks for the feedback so far, thats very interesting!
I finally adjusted the windows that I have at least the sitrep not overlapped anymore, that is much more comfortable now.
I'm using 1920x1200 res. and set the font sizes to 11 and adjusted the small fleet icon minimum size to 1.25, to have the shiptyps still identifiable having zoomed out some more. Or like this having both pedias on top of each other... but this feels strange, although I think it looks good.