I think a contest would be a great idea, but even for people that are familiar with HTML/CSS, understanding enough of the code to properly play with the design would be an additional burden and barrier to entry.
Would it be possible to make a simple, single HTML file mockup, with self-contained CSS style specification, so that one can play with the design without modifying and testing on the entire front-end code?
I would envision that the HTML file would just be a self-contained page that would display some name box mockups, and that people could play with the embedded CSS to tweak the style.
Well, the intermediate design that almost entirely removed the gradient for the white name box did give us a glimpse of that. Personally, I feel that boxes with a gradient effect look a bit out of fashion, and that more trendy UI design revolves around clean edges and flat colors these days.
I actually feel that the opposite is true. The gradient effect feels a bit like the Windows XP through 7 era to me. For an example of a slick, modern UI that is all flat colors, see this forum, for example.
I guess if a person has the skills to use a thing like that, they probably have the skills to create it.
I don’t know of an easy route from “what we have” to get there: the pages we see are generated on the fly in the client, so you can’t copy and paste their source (AFAIK). But maybe I’m just not a “raw HTML practitioner” and so it just looks hard to me?
I fully agree. Given that the current revision looks great, I don’t really feel it’s worth much effort just to play with the design further.
Yeah, probably whoever decides to play with the design next would be able to create something like this. In fact, that’s exactly what I would first do, to avoid having to figure out how to run the entire front-end and set up dummy accounts/games just to get name boxes with different text colors to show up.
I’m really just throwing that idea out there for others to consider, if they decide to dive into this project.
I think there would be some benefit for making such a mock up. For example, a graphical designer might not know enough HTML/CSS to build it or play with the code directly, but they could easily be taught which numbers to change in a file to adjust the colors in the design.
To be honest, I’ve been pondering this, as well, because I’d like to see a better design put in place, and I think that in fact it’s simply easiest to fire up the front end and play with the numbers there.
The advantage of this is that you can see your work in full-screen context (which looks a lot different to isolated screenshots of the two panes) and you can try all the combinations easily (including light theme, which would also need the same design changes).
It’s not actually hard to do, and you don’t have any trouble “creating accounts” - there are accounts and games in progress at the beta site, which the front-end codebase points at.
Bhydden managed to get it going, just following the instructions so I guess anyone can eh?
(It also occurred to me that we are due for someone suggesting why can’t we have the option, in themes, of flat or shaded panels )
Yes, but there are easy and hard things. And changing colors is easy, but takes time trying out different styles. So enabling users not familiar with OGS source code to help out would help.
