Start Page Redesign

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wmayer
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by wmayer »

People, since QWebKit has been ported to Qt5, nothing prevents us to continue using HTML for the startpage.
However, this is not a Qt sub-module any more but maintained by someone else. And until now only Linux folks seem to have pre-built binaries available but macOS & Windows users have to build it on their own. But since Qt5Webkit is a fat monster the macOS guys would like to move to QtWebEngine anyway which is officially supported by Qt to reduce maintenance work.
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looo
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by looo »

wmayer wrote:And until now only Linux folks seem to have pre-built binaries available but macOS & Windows
conda now supports them all, and one of the main-maintainer has announced to to support qt-webkit for future versions of qt...
wmayer wrote:But since Qt5Webkit is a fat monster the macOS guys would like to move to QtWebEngine anyway which is officially supported by Qt
I guess qtWebEngine is a monster too, and for sure not easy to build.
wmayer
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by wmayer »

I guess qtWebEngine is a monster too, and for sure not easy to build.
Yes, it's also a monster but because it's official part of the Qt sources it doesn't require extra steps to build it. The only problem so far is that building a debug version somehow seems impossible as the linker hangs.

Btw, since we are only using the Python interface of the WebGui module inside the StartPage it actually doesn't matter much which engine is used.
triplus
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by triplus »

Just wondering. Has anybody tried to pack QtWebEngine in macOS/Windows binary? I wonder what are the caveats involved.

But anyway it would be nice to preserve web enabled FreeCAD. Not just for Start page purposes but to be there and on all platforms if needed for whatever purpose.
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sgrogan
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by sgrogan »

wmayer wrote: Tue Aug 07, 2018 2:04 pm Btw, since we are only using the Python interface of the WebGui module inside the StartPage it actually doesn't matter much which engine is used.
I think you have pointed out this before. Does FreeCAD really need an integrated full fledged browser? Maybe something more light weight would be more appropriate? If it's about the documentation, maybe that's another vote to make the on-line docs/offline-docs an "add-on"
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yorik
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by yorik »

sgrogan wrote: Wed Aug 08, 2018 9:50 pmDoes FreeCAD really need an integrated full fledged browser?
I think it could become really handy the day FreeCAD begins to use web resources. But indeed I think the whole point is that it was more or less easy to add because Qt provides a built-in web framework. If we need to do extra work to maintain it, it looses part of its interest.. But it seems that qt is decided to keep a web framework, so...
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yorik
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by yorik »

Okay, the new start page is now merged in master.

Things to know:

- The start WB now has a preferences page, where you can customize all the colors
- You can use a custom background image
- You can also use your very own HTML file and therefore fully customize your start page (for ex. for schools or companies). I'll write some docs about how it can be customized to show some FreeCAD contents
- You can add a custom folder to the documents tab, for ex. where you keep your "template" models
- You can make the start page automatically close, and switch to another WB when opening a document from the documents tab
- You can also make the start page not show when FreeCAD is openend by double-clicking a file in your desktop file browser
- Pablo Gil's stylesheets are supported. However, they will need to be adapted to theme the homepage as well. Basically, some of the contents of https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD/blob ... rtPage.css will need to be copied/adapted to the qss files
- You can display the last posts from the forum in the activity tab. This is turned off by default. Not sure it is very useful (it is much less readable than going on the forum), but it can be a good thin to lure new FreeCAD users into participating

Hope you'll like, tell me what you think, and report any problem!
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bitacovir
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by bitacovir »

yorik wrote: Mon Aug 20, 2018 2:10 pm Okay, the new start page is now merged in master.

Things to know:

- The start WB now has a preferences page, where you can customize all the colors
- You can use a custom background image
- You can also use your very own HTML file and therefore fully customize your start page (for ex. for schools or companies). I'll write some docs about how it can be customized to show some FreeCAD contents
- You can add a custom folder to the documents tab, for ex. where you keep your "template" models
- You can make the start page automatically close, and switch to another WB when opening a document from the documents tab
- You can also make the start page not show when FreeCAD is openend by double-clicking a file in your desktop file browser
- Pablo Gil's stylesheets are supported. However, they will need to be adapted to theme the homepage as well. Basically, some of the contents of https://github.com/FreeCAD/FreeCAD/blob ... rtPage.css will need to be copied/adapted to the qss files
- You can display the last posts from the forum in the activity tab. This is turned off by default. Not sure it is very useful (it is much less readable than going on the forum), but it can be a good thin to lure new FreeCAD users into participating

Hope you'll like, tell me what you think, and report any problem!
My observations:
1) Great work with the start page new options.
2) In activity tab I would suggest a link to new user showcase posts rather than a random post of the forum.
3) Can we increase the text size? I think is a bit small.
4) I think the FreeCAD icon in the boxes looks with a very low resolution.
FreeCAD_2018-08-21_19-32-25.png
FreeCAD_2018-08-21_19-32-25.png (85.01 KiB) Viewed 1287 times
OS: Windows 10
Word size of OS: 64-bit
Word size of FreeCAD: 64-bit
Version: 0.18.14420 (Git)
Build type: Release
Branch: master
Hash: 952a9a4a8064eb304bcde3d70fce0e851cd587d7
Python version: 2.7.14
Qt version: 4.8.7
Coin version: 4.0.0a
OCC version: 7.2.0
Locale: English/Australia (en_AU)
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yorik
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by yorik »

Great, thanks for testing.

The forum posts are not random, they are the latest ones. I think linking to the showcase thread is not possible, apparently phpbb only gives one global rss feed for the whole forum. Anyway, it wouldn't change very often, which would make that section a bit boring. Honestly I think the forum section should be kept disabled by most people who are frequent visitors of this forum... It's not very convenient to browser the forum there. My idea was more for FreeCAD newcomers to get a feeling of what happens on the forum, and make them want to participate instead of simply use the software :)

About the text size, I'll add a pref setting, that will solve it for everybody.

The icons are provided by Qt, from the system... Here on mine they are crystal clear. Are you on windows? I guess windows doesn't use vector scalable icons... I'll have a look at what can be done

*EDIT*
Screenshot from 2018-08-21 20-34-24.png
Screenshot from 2018-08-21 20-34-24.png (74.13 KiB) Viewed 1279 times
Most are crystal clear... indeed that FreeCAD icon is not. But I realize now that this icon is the thumbnail stored inside the file.. There is something wrong in FreeCAD, the first time you save a file the thumbnail is not correctly saved. On next saves, all is normal. I'll investigate.
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bitacovir
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Re: Start Page Redesign

Post by bitacovir »

yorik wrote: Tue Aug 21, 2018 11:32 pm
Most are crystal clear... indeed that FreeCAD icon is not. But I realize now that this icon is the thumbnail stored inside the file.. There is something wrong in FreeCAD, the first time you save a file the thumbnail is not correctly saved. On next saves, all is normal. I'll investigate.
In windows 10 they have a very bad resolution...
2018-08-21_22-56-50.png
2018-08-21_22-56-50.png (112.17 KiB) Viewed 1275 times
OS: Windows 10
Word size of OS: 64-bit
Word size of FreeCAD: 64-bit
Version: 0.18.14420 (Git)
Build type: Release
Branch: master
Hash: 952a9a4a8064eb304bcde3d70fce0e851cd587d7
Python version: 2.7.14
Qt version: 4.8.7
Coin version: 4.0.0a
OCC version: 7.2.0
Locale: English/Australia (en_AU)
::bitacovir::
==================
One must be absolutely modern.
Arthur Rimbaud (A Season in Hell -1873)

Canal Youtube Grupo Telegram de FreeCAD Español

My personal web site
My GitHub repository
Mini Airflow Tunnel Project
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