Show of hands: keep or remove "quick access" doctrine settings on right column?

[Dimitris]

Hi all,

So, as you know one of the UI elements on the right column (when a friendly unit is selected) is a "quick access" section for the various doctrine settings:



This section functionally duplicates the "General" tab of the Doctrine & ROE window:



The other sections of this window (EMCON, WRA, Withdraw & Redeploy & Target Priority Lists) are not duplicated in this section.

We are looking at various options for streamlining the UI (both from a UX and from a technical-complexity viewpoint), and one of the candidates for the chopping block is this quick-access section. The rationale is that we ourselves almost never use it, we have not observed other people using it significantly (from public video streams etc.) and it is a constant maintenance headache, as well as significantly contributing to the visual clutter on this column.

So, we are in favor of removing it. But first, we want to hear from you too. Is this UI element critical to you? Is it a frequent part of your UI flow? Do you use it enough to care if it's gone?

Penny for your thoughts.

[thewood1]

I almost never use those buttons. I use the toolbar buttons 99% of the time.

[mikerohan]

I use them when there is an issue with AAR for a particular plane/group, trying to set/reset/force the "fuel state" & "fuel state RTB"...

... but I know that AAR is an area that is being worked on. If it works better I wouldn't miss that section.

[Schr75]

I rarely use them except the "Doctrine window" button.
That one I would hate to lose, the rest I´m, fine with losing.

Søren

[blu3s]

I rarely use them except the "Doctrine window" button.
That one I would hate to lose, the rest I´m, fine with losing.

Søren

We would keep that one

[tylerblakebrandon]

I use the WRA link in the u nit quick access quite a bit especially when I am fine tuning how I want individual shooters to engage. I use it most often fine tuning my air defense assets. To me at least it is a very useful tool that I use heavily.

[Dimitris]

We are not referring to the cyan-colored link-buttons, but the multiple dropdown options under them.

[tylerblakebrandon]

We are not referring to the cyan-colored link-buttons, but the multiple dropdown options under them.

Just to clarify my response I use both the links and the drop downs. I especially use the drop downs to get a quick look at how a unit is currently configured and use them to make adjustments without opening another window.

[JFS737]

I'll be the dissenting voice. I use it often, but only the ROE section... and generally ONLY to OBSERVE the WCS status of units. I often will place a weapons HOLD on a unit vs TIGHT for a while and this is an excellent and quick way to view it (I actually use keyboard to do put them on HOLD, I don't click the box next to WCS, XXX). So I vote delete it except for ROE!

Don't read the rest of this, individual perspective coming ---> Re: this (quite awesome) quick access window in general...under EMCON... can we PLEASE make a selectable tickbox for "UNIT OBEYS EMCON (Disables manual control)" !!!! You already have the silly WARNING, just remove the word "warning" and replace it with a tickbox so I can both SEE and CHANGE the activity status of the Radars, Sonars and OECM of units? PLEASE? As it stands it's mostly useless, please activate this for single units, groups and multiple selected units. I can put this over in the features thread but since you guys are trying to "improve" the quick access I hijacked my way in.

(Also while I'm at it, maybe make the sections "moveable" .... like right click, grab and re-arrange the orders of the subsections? (UNIT ALT/SPEED, UNIT WEAPONS, UNIT FUEL, etc). And lastly, in order to clean up and streamline, since no one asked me.... possibly remove the "EMCON, WRA, SENSORS blue click boxes under "GROUP EMCON" as they are easily accessed by the aforementioned "DOCTRINE WINDOW" blue link in DOCTRINE. (and "sensors" is duplicated again in "GROUP STATUS" above, where I prefer to find it. )

Thanks and sorry, been dying to bring this up.

[slimatwar]

I almost never use those buttons. I use the toolbar buttons 99% of the time.

Me too.

[HalfLifeExpert]

I've rarely used them, but perhaps there could be a simple quick-access button to the Unit/Group doctrine window there instead?

I agree with trimming down the Unit/Group sidebar, but having a quick link there would be handy too.

JFS737 makes a good point about ROE though.

Maybe below my hypothetical quick access button could simply display the Unit/Group's ROE posture for reference, not editable from there, just a quick reference.

[thewood1]

My suggestion is probably more complicated and would add more learning overhead...

Make the right-hand unit bar a series of windows that can be selected as a stack and reordered all through the View or Options menu.

[Parel803]

I don't use it much,
regards GJ

[andytm956]

Barely use it so it could go.

[Kobu]

I do use it regularly for quick and fine adjustments and I use it continuously to quickly see what doctrine each unit is configured with.

On the other hand, as with other elements (such as "unit alt/speed") that I don't use, it's as easy as collapsing the tab if you don't use it.



Regards

[MauriceB]

Hardly use them.

(I do use Altitude and speed though. A lot of times it's just to glance to see if i overrode the auto speed and altitude)

[schweggy]

I hardly ever look at the doctrine "quick access settings", let alone actually use them.

We are looking at various options for streamlining the UI (both from a UX and from a technical-complexity viewpoint), and one of the candidates for the chopping block is this quick-access section. The rationale is that we ourselves almost never use it, we have not observed other people using it significantly (from public video streams etc.) and it is a constant maintenance headache, as well as significantly contributing to the visual clutter on this column.

Agree on this. The whole menu system could stand to be streamlined. There are multiple paths to certain tasks/options yet only one for others.

[Quark73]

I wouldn't miss it.

[ThunderCBR]

+1 for removing it. I never use and all it does is clutter the right bar with extra length.

[Mark352]

I have never used those buttons.