Saturday, September 30, 2006

WLW Text Template v1.2 Released

I've just released v1.2 of my Text Template Plugin in the CodePlex project.

For more details, please see the CodePlex project home page, but so as to not leave you hanging, here are some screenshots...

The major change from 1.2 beta to production was the addition of the About dialog and the change to real time filtering.

I just didn't like how the filtering was working as I used the plugin. It didn't feel right and not as user friendly as I'd expect a feature like this to be. So instead of forcing the user to click the "Apply" button, I changed it to real time. As you type in a title or select a category, the grid is automatically filtered.

Real time filtering changes the usage landscape a great deal, making the filter feature into a primary selection feature mechanism.  I now find myself entering a letter to very quickly narrow my list almost every time I use the plugin. Where as before it was easier just to scroll down...

Since everything is in memory the performance is pretty good. With 10-100'ish items real time rocks. With 1000 it's "okay" and workable, if not perfect... I'm betting on most people having less than 100 items, so real time it is and I'll tweak if more if people ask.

Anyway here are the screenshots...

The new About dialog. I used the stack of pennies because I thought it was a good representation of the intent of the plugin. Adding a little of of value/time savings each time you use it, adding to a lot of value over time...  ;)

 

The Select Template with the About This Plugin link and titlebar Help added.

    

The real time filtering in action.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thought you should be made aware of this. Your plugin has been resubmitted by someone else. Page can be found here: http://gallery.live.com/liveItemDetail.aspx?li=6eaa0ec9-0227-477d-b922-f5fa40bc1e0b&l=8. This person has also submitted one of my plugins as their own too.

Greg said...

sigh... It sure is my plugin.

Looks like they've just renamed the MSI and resubmitted it.

I've reported it and also emailed a contact at MS that might be able to help.

THANK YOU for pointing this out.

Greg said...

The unauthorized resubmission was removed by Microsoft... yeah!

Unknown said...

Greg,

I didn't know where else to post this, but can you help me figure out why I can't seem to get the icon feature to work with your plugin? It would be much appreciated! :)

Great plugin, by the way.

Greg said...

You know I've seen that happen too a couple times but when I break out the code, I'm never able to reproduce it...

What OS are you using?

Tessa said...

Vista- of course- my dad gave me his new laptop that he longer needed and it had Vista on it. My family elected me to get to know Vista before they all feel they have to shift over to it. Lucky me :)