User Interface Guidelines

From Aptana Development

Contents

General User Interface Guidelines

  • Consult Extension Points document before adding a new extension point or coupling plugins
  • Use a UIJob over Display.aSyncExec
  • Toolbar actions and actions contained in drop-down menus should be mutually exclusive
    • See File view as example
  • Set the tooltip of every button and action used
    • Ensure this string is externalized as well
  • Use Expand All/Collapse All actions as a pair and don't have one or the other
  • Toolbar actions for an editor should only be enabled when that editor is active and disabled otherwise
    • See com.aptana.ide.editors.actions.ShowWhitespace and the plugin.xml in com.aptana.ide.editor.html
  • Check for an appropriate Eclipse icon before creating a new icon
  • Buttons/Actions tied to a table, tree, or some other selection-based widget should only be enabled when they are available
    • See com.aptana.ide.editor.html.preferences.FoldingPreferencePage as an example
  • Button/Actions that remove or add things to a control should maintain a selection inside that control so they can be repeatably clicked without re-selection required by the user
    • See com.aptana.ide.editor.html.preferences.FoldingPreferencePage as an example
  • Buttons/Actions that toggle the content shown in views should be saved as preferences so they persist
    • See Validation view as example
  • Use the Job class and addJobChangeListener method for lengthy operations triggered on the UI thread
  • Use com.aptana.ide.editors.preferences.PreferenceMastHead to achieve the preference heading used in the Aptana root editor pages
  • Ellipsify (append '...' to) all button labels for buttons that open a new window or dialog

Preference Page Guidelines

  • Use the org.eclipse.ui.keywords extension point to add keywords for preference page when content is typed in the filter box
  • Re-use the keywords in the com.aptana.ide.editors plugin for other new editor preference pages
  • Don't externalize strings that are preference name or value constants

Toolbar Guidelines

  • When adding perspective toolbar action make sure to set the action set visible attribute to false and then set that action set visible only for the Aptana perspective
    • See com.aptana.ide.intro.actionSet inside the com.aptana.ide.intro plugin.xml for an example

View Guidelines

  • Return from createPartControl or createControl as fast as possible
    • Use loading icon/text when needed, it is better than holding things up on the UI thread
  • Use PageBookView for views tied to editors
    • Use com.aptana.ide.editors.unified.UnifiedMessagePage for as message page when no editor or invalid editor is active
  • Use Help icon on the toolbar that displays help for that view
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