Running in portrait mode - HUD etc.

[ffutures]

I was doing some layout work today with my monitor in portrait mode, and while it was that way around I took the opportunity to check how Oolite runs in that mode.

Answer: very pleasantly surprised in most respects, but I think a few tweaks may be needed, especially for HUDs. This is obviously very low priority, most people never use their monitors that way, but it's a rather nice demo of the versatility of Oolite, it might as well work well.

Here are some snapshots:



To set the scene - this is a Boa Cruiser, normally you don't see any part of the ship in the forward view, but in portrait mode the vertical angle is wide enough that you see the nose of the ship below the cockpit. With one exception all of the HUD is right at the bottom of the screen. That exception is the indicator for reduced sensitivity controls, which is way up above the rest of the HUD. I'm not sure why that would be, but since it's a late addition to HUDs I'm guessing that there's something odd about the code governing its position. Possibly it's setting position relative to the centre of the screen, not the other HUD components?

A more important point is that the HUD position at the bottom of the screen isn't ideal in this mode - it's so far down that you have to look away from the weapon crosshairs to see what's going on. Maybe what's needed is a special portrait mode HUD - raising all of the instruments to a higher position on the screen is one obvious possibility, but with all that vertical space to play with maybe there are alternatives, such as a radar display the full width of the screen with the other instruments below it. Or some instruments below the vertical centre, others above it.

As I said, this is REALLY low priority , I'm just mentioning it in case someone wants to try something a little different from the usual OXPs.

[cim]

That exception is the indicator for reduced sensitivity controls, which is way up above the rest of the HUD.

Thanks - I'll fix that.

[Diziet Sma]

A more important point is that the HUD position at the bottom of the screen isn't ideal in this mode - it's so far down that you have to look away from the weapon crosshairs to see what's going on. Maybe what's needed is a special portrait mode HUD - raising all of the instruments to a higher position on the screen is one obvious possibility, but with all that vertical space to play with maybe there are alternatives, such as a radar display the full width of the screen with the other instruments below it. Or some instruments below the vertical centre, others above it.

I wonder how NumericHUD would look with it? That puts some key info up closer to the crosshairs.

[Zireael]

Alternately you could try Cyan HUD or CombatHUD - they put important stuff close to crosshairs, too.

[Norby]

I wonder how NumericHUD would look with it?

You can try in windowed mode:

[ffutures]

My problem with these fixes is that they leave the radar down at the bottom of the screen, and that's probably the instrument I need the most - since I wear varifocal glasses I can't see it clearly without moving my head, much more than for any HUD in landscape mode. That's why I was suggesting that moving it up the screen might be a good idea. That's an extreme case, but anyone using portrait mode is definitely going to be looking up and down much more than a normal user.

Again, this is definitely not an urgent problem, I just think it'd be a fun one for someone who likes writing HUDs.

[ffutures]

Forgot to say that another reason to change the layout is that this format makes the radar seem fairly small with any of the standard HUDs - what would be ideal is something closer to the full width of the screen. The extra vertical space makes that possible.