thumbgen wrote:kmf18914 wrote:I personally am finding this learning curve a bit steep but I come at this with little prior knowledge of XML/XLST, programming and Photoshop newbie. I am finding that without the experience of have developed and designed templates, I am learning to speak a new language and still need to figure out how to translate ideas conveyed in the forums onto the Generator.
I don't understand what XML/XSLT knowledge u need to drop some images/texts on the canvas, set some properties and click "Save" to template.xml
Transformations and other stuff are for advanced template-makers (if they want to adjust the behavior of the template dynamically at runtime).
Maybe this is a better way to express what I was trying to convey....When I think of a "template layout design" that is a visual process and would normally start with a sketch of some sort (usually the old paper and pencil version) and then go to the PC to make it digital. When in the layout program, I am still in the "Visual mindset" and primarily use my mouse for 95% of the movements....
The new program has a much heavier leaning towards design from the technical level and the vast majority of the work is done by keying in coordinates for each element. So without having a good background in setting up XML's in the past -- I am not picking up a piece of software as easily as I usually do. Again, I know this is an alpha-level touch and you have already indicated that navigation through the element properties fields need to be worked on -- it's does not follow the "TAB" key direction and many times cursor in "in" the box but the entry is not active. And you really need a pretty good understanding of the terminiolgy and jargon attached to the program (tokens, what's the way to enter if the infor is from file, directory or feed, etc) as well as the information that is pulled in from ImageDraw (I assume that is the rendering agent). And I am sure this is first pass and will be worked on, but right now I click on either the token map or setting button and after clicking to lowest level, nothing appears to happen. I know what I have to do, but I can't figure out how to apply these in the software.
You indicated that your goal is to have this be so easy and user-friendly so no one has to go to the other costly and difficult-to-learn programs, there is still opportunity to further develop there and make this a less technical and information driven process and not let that level of detail slow down the creative side.
Thanks for the chance to share my opinion. I look forward to the next steps.
KMF
