It would be great to be able to add internal links in patches. We have the string IOBoxes which can be “comments” or “links”.
Once you have fairly complex patches it’s always nice to leave comments, so others can understand more easily. But if you want to say where something is defined or something is used in a different part of a patch, it would be nice to be able to have internal links.
I imagine that I can link to any definition/patch by right-clicking and selecting Edit → “Copy Link to here”. It could also make sense to do it on groups, so I can right-click a group and say “Copy Link to group” and it copies a link. Then in a string IOBox with type link I can paste the link. Now I can for example say "This datatype is defined here: " link and you can click on it and you are taken to the definition.
I think it would really help with comments in patches and I don’t have to try to explain where something is defined".
For example in Notion you can right-click any element and select “Copy link to Block”
Or in a different example in the Greybook you can copy a link to a specific section
Something like this in vvvv would be great!
I hope it makes sense.
ps: @joreg I noticed in the grey book in the section on string IOBoxes there is no explanation for the string type “Script” and it isn’t immediately clear what it does.
Was playing around with some app architecture test, and noticed that there is a thing that bothers a lot, like i have root patch, and i have some patch that i’m depending on, right now to get to the definitions i need to go to dependencies, files and so on, i think it would be great to have some sort of Anchor Link, like i could place it in the patch and go to definitions of another patch by just opening a link…
I also think there should be a way to go the definition of any node. There is Cmd-Shift-` to go to the root definitions of a document, there is the solution explorer to see where a definition is used and you can middle-click on any node to go INTO the definition. But there doesn’t seem to be a way to simply go to the definition. Usually I want to go there to duplicate it or move it somewhere more sensible.
When you have complex documents with many places where things are defined, it can be super painful to have to try to find a definition.
there is actually an easy 2-step process to do this
open node (eg. middle-clicking)
CMD+SHIFT+^ (which brings you up one level in the hierarchy of the document)
but I do agree that a one-step shortcut would make it easier. also, immediately highlighting the node/definition in question (similar to what the search function does) would help a lot.
I also agree with the “jump to different part in document” request, similar to HTML-anchors. also here, the available search function shows how this could look like (please don’t take this as a solution suggestion, it’s just to create a vision)
create a node just for the sake of having a link target and give a specific name (which is the link)
abuse the find function (CTRL+F) to jump to this node in the document by searching for it
this does not work to find nodes in subpatches though :( and of course, having a clickable link/comment to jump to this other section would be much better UX
That’s it. I know about the shortcut to go to the document above. But when you have several definition pages like this, you still have to search again.
Gamma is long overdue for a lot of interface innovation. The links you mention are a very good idea. They could work about as well as the mentions in this forum. The problem is that it would require a completely new type of interface element.
I’ve had the idea for a long time that it would be cool to have interface elements that could be patched! There was a similar practice in beta, although it didn’t work well (Alt+2). Perhaps if we had a more universal tool for working with the interface, the development of such a tool would fall on the shoulders of users rather than developers, and then there would be custom extensions.
For example, I dream of being able to create nodes that have an interface that you can interact with and that can output data. If there was a system that allowed you to create interfaces in nodes, then it could possibly be used to create the referential relationship of a patch, I think.
But in general the idea is good, because it would be cool to have a “Help” type window open on the project - and by clicking on “this happens here” or “that happens here” you could go straight to the right place. An anchor link would go well with this.
It’s a good point, but categories and groups sometimes make things worse: instead of a few clicks, you sometimes need dozens. And by the way, one does not exclude the other - the same anchoring can also work in groups. I think this is in many ways a good reason to rethink UX/UI. I’ve gotten lost in chains of groups more than once, sometimes forgetting what the groups mean altogether. I don’t think it’s a huge problem, but it’s there.
I think we need a slogan for UI/UX innovation - ‘Fewer clicks - better patches’.
