Loading color palette by dropdown select

[micker]

hello
it realy strange for beguiner to load color palette
and when user understand the way to find palette is very bad ....
it will great to have :
a simple dropdown that list all palette in default folder => if user add palette inside list is auto update
a button to load an external palette (folder outside of scribus)
thanks for consideration

[a.l.e]

hi

the "normal" workflow is not to load a palette, but to create your colors according a graphical charter.
(and load the colors from an existing file...)

or just pick random colors.

or use the "color wheel" tool to create matching colors.

scribus can set the current palette, but it's probably a feature most people should not use...

[micker]

pi

hi

the "normal" workflow is not to load a palette, but to create your colors according a graphical charter.
(and load the colors from an existing file...)

yes but loading an existing file or palette link ubuntu or other is too difficult for starter

or just pick random colors.

many time you start with white document

or use the "color wheel" tool to create matching colors.

yes i know thanks

scribus can set the current palette, but it's probably a feature most people should not use...

if we want to become more userfriendly we need to enchance this :
maybe more color at first not only 5 colors but a light palette
i teach scribus to many person (50p last year) i like opensource promotion and it REALY a problem at first openning ...
user : why only this colors, this software is limited ?
me : we will adding color => need time to add one by one or trying to load preset but path is understable for user
user : it's not userfriendly

i realy think it's a little enchanced but it will be good for beguinner => we can't forgot end-user

[Nermander]

If a palette should be the default, which one should it be? You will get as many answers as there are users. Some want to have RGB colors, other want CMYK and yet others just want spot colors. It all depends on the needs of the user.

You should tell your users "No, Scribus is not limited, in Scribus you can define ANY color. Even colors like gold or silver."

[micker]

If a palette should be the default, which one should it be? You will get as many answers as there are users. Some want to have RGB colors, other want CMYK and yet others just want spot colors. It all depends on the needs of the user.

You should tell your users "No, Scribus is not limited, in Scribus you can define ANY color. Even colors like gold or silver."

yes i am agree but i notice that changing palette is difficult.
we can say this only if palette management is more simple i think
Scribus isn't only for PAO pro i think he is for all user
think about this 

[GarryP]

micker, as a.l.e. has said above, a lot of people just create colours as they need them or according to a palette that has been defined for the publication they are working on. That is the normal way of working for Desktop Publishing; too many colours can spoil a good layout.

However, I think I can understand where you're coming from. A lot of beginners will not feel comfortable creating their own colours and would like to be able to simply choose from a preset palette with a decent range of defaults, like you do in Inkscape, LibreOffice etc. And some people might not even realise that colours can be changed through the Colour Manager - it's a bit "hidden" in the Edit menu - and think that the only colours that are available are the ones listed in the Colours tab of the Properties Palette.

It might be good if Scribus allowed users to change colours via the PP Colours tab. At the very least a button could be given to get to the Colours Manager as an alternative to the Edit menu route. Or a context sensitive menu from the Colours tab where users can add/change/remove individual colours.

In the meantime, have you seen this article: https://wiki.scribus.net/canvas/How_to_create_your_own_colours ? It tells you how to create and manage colours, including an easy way of adding colours from the various palettes included with Scribus ("Creating a new colour from an existing palette"). It might be worth some time looking through it as it could save you time in the future.

[utnik]

hi micker


as you teach scribus, your aversion against the way scribus deals with colors will jump to your pupil – unless you understand the idea and tell them what's your problem and why scribus works the way it does. (so try to understand the idea behind...)


utnik

[micker]

hello i realy love scribus i think it realy good software ... many user that use indesign link scribus after 10m
i am just propose some feature that ALL user (but doesn't post in this forum) return
i think UX ethic is good but don't forgot to think at beguinner

=> for now we lost many time for manage color that my propose 

[a.l.e]

personally, i don't like the list of colors defined by default in scribus.

they don't make sense to me.

and it should be (much) easier to create new colors. (as garry writes: it should happen from the PP!)

but i'm not sure that making it easier to add palettes or "enlarging" the current default palette is the way to go.

i love to do things for the beginners, but they should not get in the way of the "pro" users... and having more colors means only that you have to delete them / cannot concentrate on *your* colors...

i think that one should be able to chose in the preferences a default color space.
if one choses RGB, the color that are automatically generated will be RGB.
if one choses CMYK, she will get a few CMYK colors.
if none is selected, you get an RGB black and one (or several?) CMYK black(s).

the current mix is a bit of a nonsense to me.

and, of course, one should be able to define her own set of colors.

[a.l.e]

p.s.: those are rather simple changes, but somebody has to sit down and make a real specification, push it to be accepted by the team and then find somebody to program it... volunteers are welcome!

[micker]

i am not a dev but i use scribus a lot and i teach a lot i only can post my exp 
thanks for discusion

[GarryP]

I think I like the idea of setting a colour space in the Preferences.

If you expect your document to be printed then I'd guess that Scribus could make it "awkward" in some way to choose RGB colours, and the other way round if you are designing a screen-only document. Mixing RBG/CMYK isn't a good way to go. (And I'm not totally sure but shouldn't spot colours be "invalid" for screen-only documents too?)

One problem would be that Scribus would have to default to one or the other and so which would it default to? And who would choose the out-of-the-box default? Is the "average" Scribus user a screen-only person or a print person? Would a beginner know what it was all about or do they have to learn about it just to use Scribus?

You could have an extra "What type of document are you making? Print/Screen" option on the New Document dialog but it might not be known at first (User: "I just want to make something!"), and may just be confusing (User: "I've no idea what this is so I'll ignore it.").

And, if you later change the colour space, what happens to the colours defined in the previous space? Under the above "regime" they must either all be removed/hidden or Scribus would have to convert them, which would leave the problem of what to do with out-of-gamut colours. And I'm sure there will be other issues. Like you say a.l.e, it needs a proper specification so these things are worked out before anyone starts to change any code.

As I said previously, I think that having more colours in the default palette would be helpful for beginners. It gives them something to work with out-of-the-box without having to get into all of the more complicated colour stuff. Just a few extra shades of colours on top of the basic colours would do. (Pro users only have to use four mouse clicks to remove what's already there so it's not a huge overhead for them.)

[utnik]

hi garry

...having more colours in the default palette would be helpful for beginners. It gives them something to work with out-of-the-box...

i don't agree. more ootb-colors would lead to use these colors only (and to complain about the lack of colors...)
my standard palette for empty documents is as small as nine main colors (red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, yellow, black, white and 'registration'). with such a small basic palette even a beginner would generate his own colors... (for my standard documents i have templates with adapted color sets.)

utnik

[micker]

@garryp the idea to display "Add color" button in color panel (open same windows) will be great
simple, good for beginer and no need to rewrite the whell lol

[GarryP]

utnik: I think we're going to have to agree to disagree on that issue.

While I understand where you're coming from, the testimony of the original poster clearly shows that - for some people - the lack of out-of-the-box colours is confusing, especially because there's no obvious (to the beginner) way of adding new colours.

Adding a few more colours wouldn't change this situation but at least it would give beginners more to start with before they learn more about the software. It's obvious to me from the testimony that the current situation isn't ideal but what the ideal might be is something I couldn't define.

Most other graphical applications give you a decent selection of colours to start with. For example, Inkscape - by default - gives you a big scrolling area that you can select from. Even LibreOffice gives you more to work with than Scribus.

Having said that, some other applications don't give you much to start with. GIMP, for instance, only gives you black and white from the start (until you figure out how to change colours or bring up the Palettes/Colours palettes).

It takes us down the route of wondering how much the user needs to learn about the software before they can start using it for things that are more than just tests. Personally I'd like to see Scribus give the user more from the start but that's just my opinion. I can see things from the other side of the argument too.

I have a proposal:

1. Rename the PP "Line" tab as "Line and Fill".
2. Move the Line and Fill Colour settings from the "Colours" tab to the "Line and Fill" tab.
3. Make line and fill colour selection as a drop-down menus, as it is with Text colour.
4. Rename the "Colours" tab as "Colours and Palettes".
5. Move the functions of the Colour Manager to this tab (this would also mean that editing colours was then non-modal, which would be a big help).
6. Add a function - drop-down menu? - in this renamed tab to easily choose between different palettes, e.g. Sparse (white and the blacks); Basic (current Scribus defaults); Custom (whatever the user wants); all of the other palettes that Scribus comes bundled with.

Doing the above would:

A. Put all of the Line/Fill-related stuff in one place (which sounds more obvious to me).
B. Make colour selection more consistent (the current mix of drop-downs and lists is confusing).
C. Move palette and colour selection/modification up-front so that it's visible to all users (and not "hidden" in a menu selection and modal dialog).
D. Make it obvious that you can change what colours you're using.

Colours aren't handled very well in Scribus at the moment - from a user interface perspective - so anything that makes it easier for people to get to grips with them will be a good thing.

There has to be a better way of doing things than the current situation.

micker: The above proposal is an expansion of what I suggested earlier so I hope it would also be a good thing.