Ok, I figured it out. What I said wasn’t entirely accurate. What happens is that if you set an Activate Application action within a menu button, the application being activated becomes the title of the button itself. I made a video showing the issue:
Blockquote
• Buttons getting locked out when trying to move them. It happens less often, but still quite a bit
Ok, this will have to wait for 1.8 - we already have a new grid architecture planned that will dramatically streamline the grid data processing regardless of grids complexity etc.
Blockquote
• The list of my local apps in both the Activate action and the Icon Selector is usually incomplete. Restarting MGP usually fixes it, but sometimes I have to reboot my computer along with MGP to get the full list to show up. In addition to this, if I’ve assigned a macro to a specific app, it won’t work if the app doesn’t show up in that list.
This will be investigated and fixed if needed in 1.7.1 release cycle.
Blockquote
Ok, I figured it out. What I said wasn’t entirely accurate. What happens is that if you set an Activate Application action within a menu button, the application being activated becomes the title of the button itself. I made a video showing the issue:
This will be fixed in Metagrid Pro 1.7.x release cycle.
A couple of things that could be improved:
-
When creating a button via the highlight squares/long press method, after lifting the finger, the Split/Clear/Copy/Right Pane options disappear. Which requires two more taps to get those options back.
-
I understand that the logs provided by users are extremely useful for development. It would be awesome if MGP displayed a ‘MGP shut down unexpectedly, do you want to upload log files to HQ’ type prompt on the next startup.
A small issue:
When viewing the macro via the right pane swipe method, some entries disappear.
After doing a full build of the entire Google app suite, I came across a few things:
• This can be random, but happens more than not. 3-step gradient doesn’t appear when selected in the “latch on” side of a latching button. The effect itself is visible, but you can only choose from two colors. There were a number of scenarios working with latching buttons where design options didn’t carry over between the two states.
• There should be a “Function” key button in the list of keys available for building shortcuts. Not F1, F2, F3, etc., but “Fn”. On a Mac, especially, Apple’s gotten way into assigning shortcuts to the Function or “Globe” key-plus modifiers for shortcuts.
• A super useful function in spreadsheet and design apps is a “Repeat” command where you can repeat the cached action as many times as you want until you do something else. For designing visual elements in MGP this would speed things way up, even over “Paste Style” if you’re doing a lot of different changes.
• I’ve noticed that being able to swipe the grid back and forth while the inspector is open is somewhat random. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. I’m not sure what drives that, but having it move freely is much more helpful for designing elements.
• In the macro editor, having the ability to paste the actions only of a macro to other buttons without changing the macro title of the buttons being copied to would be super helpful. I often create groups of buttons by starting with a basic button and type in all the text and macro names so I know what goes where as I add functionality. Many times those buttons require similar macros with a small change like simply editing the text entry field. The way it is now, if I try to copy paste a similar macro to another button, I have to re-enter the title again.
• When adding or deleting style copy parameters the menu snaps around as you edit it and it’s very easy to lose your place and select something you didn’t want to select. This also happens when editing lots of different parameters across multiple buttons. The inspector hops around with every new button. It’s disorienting if you’re concentrating on one aspect of a group of buttons and want the inspector to sit still.
• The action bar for editing buttons (Paste, Paste Style, Cancel, AI, etc.) gets in the way of adjacent buttons a LOT. It would be great if there was a fixed area, like a simple “X”, to clear it when editing. Right now, it’s very easy to accidentally do something you didn’t want to do because of trying to work around the bar.
• It would be great if the re-order macros capability in menu buttons wasn’t nested in another menu and sat in the actual macro list builder menu. Or even better, just being able to drag the little numbers that are assigned to the macros to different positions that automatically re-number would be really slick.
• In the AI Builder, being able to paste a saved prompt and edit it BEFORE it’s activated would be killer. Right now, it activates right away and the AI starts doing what it just did while you’re editing.
• For New Grid, the choice for it to be Grid-Only or Grid with Scene seems like it should be a checkbox thing on the same setup page with everything else and not a separate dialog box.
• The last thing is just a design wish. It would be great to be able to view the palette and icon libraries and palette editor OUTSIDE of the inspector just for the purpose of examining or working on assets while not having to be in an active grid.
Thanks!
M
Another couple of suggestions:
- The action bar for editing buttons (Paste, Paste Style etc.) should house the ‘Done’ button. It’s currently an unnecessary extra movement to the top right of the screen, especially when editing buttons at the bottom of the grid. The ‘Split’ and ‘Clear’ buttons could be the same size as ‘Copy’ etc. And this would make room for the ‘Done’ button.
- The ‘Copy & Paste Style’ list for ‘Button’ and ‘Fader’ has 10 unnecessary spaces. This means more scrolling. And the font for each category should be larger than the font for its attributes. At the moment its bold but smaller. And the icon for each category should be larger and blue like it is in the right pane. This would make it clearer if those 10 unnecessary gaps were removed.
- When saving a Snapshot, the one that has just been saved should be highlighted if ‘Highlight Selection’ is activated.
To be investigated and fixed in 1.7.x cycle.
Unfortunately, that’s not possible - there is no way on Earth to emulate this button - Apple made it impossible unfortunately.
This is coming with Macro Editor refactor in MetaGrid Pro 1.8. this year.
To be investigated.
OK, will have to figure out how to make it in an elegant way.
OK, to be improved in 1.7.x cycle
I don’t actually get it - what’s the scenario M.?
• It would be great if the re-order macros capability in menu buttons wasn’t nested in another menu and sat in the actual macro list builder menu. Or even better, just being able to drag the little numbers that are assigned to the macros to different positions that automatically re-number would be really slick.
[/quote]
That will come in the redesigned Macro Editor in 1.8 this year.
OK, to be improved in 1.7.1.
Hmmm - don’t quite agree with this - the setup page defines grid-related parameters - the popup specifies the assignments. Why is this a nuisance for you ?
I need the scenario for this :-).
How should this work in detail? Currently the context bar is dynamic - it is always displayed on tap and you can hide it by tapping the edited button, right?
OK, we will improve the layout - reduce the spacings and make it consistent with the inspector.
OK, good point - will see if it is possible to deliver it in 1.7.x or if it requires some data model changes.
[quote=“JTB, post:24, topic:1433, full:true”]
A couple of things that could be improved:
Ok, definitely room for improvement there - 1.7.x it is.
Unfortunately, it is not possible - MetaGrid Pro doesn’t know it crashes unexpectedly :-). This information is known to iPadOS though - that’s why the iPad analytics are so valuable (and the IPS crash logs).
To be investigated - more info needed on this - what entires?
After tapping ‘Paste’, ‘Paste Style > Apply’, ‘Tile’ ‘Split’ or ‘Merge’, the context bar should remain and display the ‘Done’ button and possibly an ‘Undo’ button.
And after tapping ‘Clear’ or ‘Tile’ the context bar should remain with a ‘Done’ button and possibly and ‘Undo’ button available. Here is a picture of a possible layout.
I assume what @McDub is talking about is instead of my suggestion to have ‘Done’ on the context bar, we would have an ‘X’ instead, as an easy/quick way of hiding the context bar. I agree with McDub here. The context bar constantly changes position relative to the edited button e.g. if I’m in the centre, left, right etc. of the grid. So it is counter muscle memory when hiding the context bar.
The currently edited button needs a more visible highlight as it tends to be lost with the glare of the context bar.
Quick update after going through this running list against the current MetaGrid Pro 1.7.2 line.
The following items from this thread should now be fixed/addressed in 1.7.2:
- Crash when deleting the active profile - Content Manager now falls back safely when the active profile/grid/workspace item is deleted.
- Workspace activation on highlight in Content Manager - tapping/highlighting a workspace is now treated as preview/selection, not an activation commit.
- Return To Previous Grid after editing - navigation history is now preserved through Edit Mode.
- Selected color indicator visibility - the selected swatch indicator has been made clearer.
- Color indicator / shared color state - additional fixes were made around the color indicator behavior.
- Text background attributes on transferred/installed grids - text background attributes are now preserved more reliably.
- Paste/copy into empty or merged grid regions - fixed an issue where paste could leave an uncovered/blank region in the grid layout.
- Secondary Action grid assignment persistence - fixed an issue where a grid assignment for secondary actions was not persisted.
Also improved, but worth keeping an eye on:
- Button/element move lock-outs - several drag/drop validation and layout-editing fixes are in place. If this still happens in 1.7.2, please send a short repro/video because it may now be a more specific remaining case.
- App list / Activate action / Icon Selector reliability - app-list locking and related host/app handling have been hardened. If the local app list is still incomplete in 1.7.2, please report it as a fresh repro with the host OS and whether a restart fixes it.
Still being tracked separately from the above:
- Snapshot sizing/orientation/invisible desktop cases
- Context bar / edit action bar behavior
- Macro Editor workflow requests
- Latching Switch state/style parity
- XY controller snapshot/count issues
- Custom color palette cloud transfer issues
- Inspector/style-copy polish
Thanks again for keeping this list so detailed. It makes it much easier to connect reports to fixes and to avoid losing smaller issues in the noise.
2 Likes
One issue that just popped up:
I have all of my grids set with the same High Tech Texture as the background with the Transparency set to 50%. If I select a grid, that I just created with a High Tech Image and the Transparency set to 20%, when I go back to one of my other grid’s, the backgrounds look to be very dim, like 5%, if that.
Also, there is still a previously reported quirk where selecting a background texture or image in the Grid Editor results in the UI switching back to the list of Grids not the Grid Editor which makes for waaay too many extra taps when editing multiple grid backgrounds.
1.6.19 (35764)
Blockquote
One issue that just popped up:
I have all of my grids set with the same High Tech Texture as the background with the Transparency set to 50%. If I select a grid, that I just created with a High Tech Image and the Transparency set to 20%, when I go back to one of my other grid’s, the backgrounds look to be very dim, like 5%, if that.
Also, there is still a previously reported quirk where selecting a background texture or image in the Grid Editor results in the UI switching back to the list of Grids not the Grid Editor which makes for waaay too many extra taps when editing multiple grid backgrounds.
1.6.19 (35764)
These are solved in 1.7.x.
1 Like
