user-defined tick boxes

[jadrain]

Personally I think this would be a retrograde step ...

Hi Jonathan,

I must disagree that it is not a retrograde step if it is added as a preference option. I have never suggested Jon should change the colour coding scheme, other than to allow more flexibility. I do not think flexibility can ever be a retrograde.

Kindest regards,
Shayne

Yes, mate, but when I wrote that, the possibility of it being made an either/or preference hadn't been raised by Jon. I was responding to the possibility of losing all-colour records, not the possibility of adding first-column only as an option.

Jonathan

[jadrain]

I am not sure if I agree with your argument against check boxes. The whole point is that it is user-specific. It could be an icon, an emoticon, or simply a box with a user-definable name.

The problem, though, is really "which"? Jon would then have to provide some icon alternatives as part of the setup? Or else there is still the problem of how to identify what exactly the tick box does. It's potentially a useful feature, but its implementation has some messy issues that may not be worth the bother.

I agree that increasing the number of visible columns in the List View would be great, but do not think that this would solve the problem--not that there is a problem. I see these as separate issues. I think a user-definable tick/check box would be incredibly useful. In that sense, I also see it as a way of displaying data more than adding new data/fields.

Adding an extra narrow column and putting in it a spare field in which you enter a check mark where relevant would be almost exactly the same as adding a binary check toggle. The only difference would be that you'd have to type in the check character instead of just clicking a box or button. So I think the ability to go beyond five columns (which would be really, really nice for other reasons as well) would be an acceptable way of adding this functionality.

Jonathan

[Jon]

Hi all. FWIW, I have made single column/all a preference choice for colors in 9.0.4. I'm not sure I'll be adding more columns in the near future or not, but I do think it might be a good idea, so I'll be giving it some thought.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Shayne]

Alternatively, you could create a format that displayed what you want, and use View Formatted to see what you'd like to keep track of.

Hi Jon,

I am following up on this idea. Is it possible somehow to display a format in the View Formatted Pane other than that which is selected by the Formatter?
Is there, for instance, a way to set the View Formatted Pane to show the Secondary Order without having to press Shift each time? A preference that allowed one to choose whether the View Formatted Pane displayed the Primary or Secondary Order would be great. I envisage displaying the Secondary (or Primary), but only ever copying the Primary.

Does this sound useful, or possible?

Kindest regards,
Shayne

[Jon]

Hi Shayne,

There is a popup menu in the View Formatted pane that lets you select the format easily -- no need to use Biblio Formatter.

As for displaying secondary order...I don't know how generally useful this would be.

Jon
Sonny Software

[Shayne]

There is a popup menu in the View Formatted pane that lets you select the format easily -- no need to use Biblio Formatter.

As for displaying secondary order...I don't know how generally useful this would be.

Thanks Jon,

I use the very useful popup menu in the View Formatted pane, that is what I carelessly referred to as the Formatter. Apologies.

I took your advice and created a format that displays what I want (whether or not I have a hard copy of an article, and if so, where). This works wonderfully, but the information is primarily available only through the View Formatted pane. To make it available in the List View would eat into the quota of 5 columns, so is not a good solution. But as this information is, in my case, never to be output as part of a bibliography, it would require switching back and forth via the popup menu all the time.

For these reasons, I would find the ability to set the display to Secondary Order useful. Perhaps another way of doing the same thing is to be able to display in one format (x), but drag or copy in another (y). It seems to me that at the moment the display format is the same as the format that is copied, etc. I suspect most people would normally display x and copy from x, but the ability to set these separately would be useful (I think).

Kindest regards,
Shayne