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BrainBlast

A Project Planning & Reference Management Tool For Creatives. · By JeJuneCartoons

Some small QoL issues

A topic by steelfeathers created 15 days ago Views: 61 Replies: 11
Viewing posts 1 to 4
(1 edit) (+1)

Minor issues I've run into while using this tool:

  • Can be very difficult to move text boxes, trying to grab them often ends up placing the cursor to start typing
  • Title boxes can't be expanded/shrunk
  • I would expect to be able to group-select items to move them together by dragging to highlight multiple things at once, but even though they are highlighted, I can't move them.
  • The default pan speed is really slow and tedious, I want an option to speed it up
  • Zoom seems inconsistent in terms of how much it zooms in or out at each level
  • Would love the ability to turn on grid-snapping, for cleaner organization
(+1)

More:

- In checklists, if you Tab to indent but then backspace, it creates a double-tall checklist item that can't be shrunk back to normal size
- It's kinda un-intuitive that you have to shift+enter to create a new row in a checklist. In most programs I'm familiar with, shift+enter is to continue with your current message, and plain old enter gets you a new line. But that's reversed here. Feels a bit weird.
- I'd like to be able to rename my pages, instead of just board_1, board_2, etc

Developer (1 edit)

Thanks you for your interest in the app and the detailed feedback I’ll try and address these either here or in the next patch / update.

  • If we’re talking about Jots there is a counter for whether to drag or enter text selection, on first click it will merely select the node and allow dragging, while a second click will enter the text box, this was implemented so that the card doesn’t get dragged when you’re trying to select text, if you make a habit of deselecting (clicking outside any node) before dragging cards it should be more consistent but I’ll take a look at possible changes.

  • At the moment this is the intended functionality, the title text box expands according to the text inside. If you expand a box but then remove text and want it to go back to the default or new smaller size you can click the right side of the box and it will reset if the box is currently larger than the default size, and double clicking inside the text box will reset it as you type again. I may be interested in redesigning this node later to include more customization properties for text sizes, fonts, colors, etc. Open to further feedback.

  • This one may be a bug if you can find a reproducible way to do this because currently on my computer this function seems to work for both drag selections and manual multi-selections using Shift+click. Once the items are selected (indicated by the highlights) you should be able to drag any item that is selected to move the whole group, and clicking outside of the selected items will clear the selection.

  • Noted I will definitely try and add more settings next update. I have a very high DPI mouse so I don’t feel it as much but i know that’s not the case for everyone, especially those with larger resolution screens.

  • In terms of pure technical level Zoom is using a hard coded number each time for both the icons at the top and scroll-wheel scrolls. There may be some jerkiness if zooming near nodes (especially jots) as they will steal the scroll-wheels focus for their own text-boxes when hovered. This is technically the intended function so that text can be scrolled when a jot isn’t selected but I’d be open to reevaluating this.

  • This one is definitely on the Long To-DO list for future feature updates, grid alignment and general alignment tools for selections, Idk if i can promise it next update but I’ll note the desire for it.

  • Yes this is a bug, I’ll try and fix it next patch.

  • I’ll try and add a setting for this, as I do agree it’s non-standard. Personally I prefer it for the typing experience.

  • If we’re talking about SubBoards, there actually is a feature for this, underneath the icon that activates the subboard is a text box for describing the purpose of the board and that text will take the place of the boards default title (Similar to the Plot Nodes).

(2 edits)

Regarding dragging of text boxes: The larger Jot box drags just fine, since it has a border you can grab that shows a "move" icon when hovered over. However, the title text box is a gigantic pain to try to move. There is no border to grab on, and I struggle with click-on/click-off trying to grab it instead of just clicking into it (which starts text editing). This and the issue with slow panning are probably my biggest QoL gripes at the moment, they make it very frustrating to move things around or focus on different sections of the board.

As for multi-select, I've been trying to use shift-click like you mentioned, but it isn't working. If I hold shift while dragging over an area, nothing gets highlighted. If I hold shift while trying to click-and-drag multi-selected elements, they still don't move.

Developer

Thanks for the clarification, I’ll definitely add some QOL changes for these issues next update.

As for drag selection yes I’ve checked and it seems your correct it doesn’t allow you to drag when holding shift, likely because I’ve coded the nodes to ignore any other input beyond selection / deselection when shift is held. I’ll need to modify some things to change this behavior.

Are you on windows or a different version just to check? I may have to dive deeper into this bug.

Currently I find the feature works fine when I simply:

    • Drag (via LMouse button) a selection around the nodes (not holding shift or any other key).
    • Grab a node (via Lmouse button) within the selection and move the mouse in a direction (again without holding any other keys)

I tried multi-selection dragging without holding any keys at all first. I only tried using Shift when you mentioned using it in your reply. Nothing I do allows me to drag multiple elements at once. Yes, I'm on windows 11.

Developer

Very strange, I can’t seem to reproduce this bug at the moment but I’ll keeping digging.

Well now it's working. This is very odd. It certainly wasn't working earlier.

Also, dragging across multiple elements keeps highlighting the text inside those elements too. Kinda annoying.

Developer

Yes this big has eluded me for some time. I’ll try and fix it before next patch also.

For the future, I'd love to see a simple mind-mapping tool where I can link elements with arrows. Maybe just add an arrow component that can point from one thing to another.

Developer

Most definitely 🤠