Oddly enough, people who use ArchiCAD tend to also use various graphic design applications too.
As a result, there are typically hundreds of accumulated installed fonts on a user's system.
Currently the ArchiCAD font selection drop down within GDL objects is thus excruciating to use - the only navigation option within the dropdown is by RSI-inducing mouse wheel scrolling - meaning the user can spend a frustrating minute or two scrolling, every time, before they find the font they want.
What should be in these dialogs to help the user get directly to the required font is:
- Slider gadget down the side of the list
- Name search field
- And of course, a favourites option - where the last used 5-10 fonts appear at the top of the list in their own small quick select preview window, with the dialog focus starting on those favourites, rather than at the bottom end of the list, hundreds of fonts away.
- Optional office standards 'enforcement' override that simply defaults to (and self-updates when there are changes) to a centrally managed office or project standard font & pen.
All of the first three navigation features should also be applied to drop downs for line styles, fills, and all other properties selection dialogs. Including when those dialogs are invoked by library parts.
Right now we don't even have consistency between font and line style dropdowns - line style dropdowns do currently have the slider and search field at least, even if lacking the favourites. Fonts however have nothing but the scroll wheel.
Related to this 'office standards enforcement' idea is that any object containing text should be subject to it - notes, dims, markers and text elements, and even text generated by GDL, should respect the user's office standards, even in the case of GDL if the fonts, sizes or pens are hard coded or controlled by deeply buried parameters that would otherwise take an age to find, and even when the object was created long before office standards enforcement was contemplated. The GDL interpreter should have an interrupt for any text generated
Where the results are not as desired, the override mode can be disabled for that object instance.
This would cut through the timewasting pain, trial, and error that results whenever many ill-disciplined hands touch the project, or even when you make a careless mistake yourself, or import objects and files from other office's projects and platforms, or even your own office, that were created long before the adoption of your current office graphical standards.
This could be a separate wish, except for the fact that as an option 4, there would be value in including the 'enforcement' option in font dropdowns - right where the user can simply click to instantly respect the prevailing font - or explicitly choose to make an exception and override it
Open