[Libreoffice-ux-advise] Windows look

[Jan Holesovsky]

Hi Astron,

On 2012-06-19 at 15:04 +0200, Stefan Knorr wrote:

> here's another idea for the look of the menu bar in Windows: I think the
> easiest way to make it look better right is to just use the same
> gradient from left to right – removing the very complicated triangular
> gradients to the sides.*
> Therefore, can you maybe try with a simple gradient with the following
> properties?

We are just working on the same thing :-)  I'm trying to get it nicer
the entire day today, and I think I have some results now:

http://artax.karlin.mff.cuni.cz/~kendy/design-list/toolbar-gradient-2.png

I think I've understood most of the intricacies of what is happening in
the border (there is some default alpha you have to count on, and cannot
avoid), but the above seems to behave quite well over both the dark, as
well as light backgrounds (see on the right where it is placed over the
gimp's windows).

I'm still working on making the text (and the closing icon on the right)
black, instead of semi-transparent...

The screenshot also contains the updated toolbar gradient, and lighter
line between the menubar and the toolbar as proposed by Mirek - thank
you! :-)

> width: inner left light border to inner right light border
> height: 35px @ Segoe/9pt/96ppi (higher/lower for other menu font sizes)
> top: #FFFFFF00
> (15% from top: #FFFFFF0F)
> (70% from top: #FFFFFF96)
> bottom: #FFFFFFC8
> 
> [The steps in parentheses aren't strictly necessary, but the first
> should avoid the gradient looking too harsh over dark backgrounds, the
> second should improve readability a bit.]
> I've attached a mockup of the approximate look. Do you think you could
> make this work? (Also, sorry for saying that making the menu font black
> were simple – I clearly spoke with ignorance there.)

Please let me know if the above works for you - further tweaking is
still possible, of course :-)

> * In the future, we could possibly put an SVG image under the menu to
> achieve an effect more similar to MSO 2010, but clearly this is not the
> time for such a proposal.

So far it seems easier to 'compute' the look; but let's see later.

All the best,
Kendy