Improving the New Lineage View

[NotBambi]

There's a topic about bringing back the Old Lineage View and improvement suggestions to the New one are getting lost. This is just to offer input on how the New Lineage View could be improved.

Something that needs improving is the spacing.

Ideas on how?

Additional feedback?

 

 

 

[Fuzzbucket]

The big one for me would be only breaking up names when there is a word break. I guess there'd have to be some way to deal with monstrously long names - maybe a hyphen?

 

If people are that hung up about boxes, maybe rather than the legacy view that has been asked for, just an option to "show boxes"...

[Saami]

The only suggestion I have is changing the outline of the boxes to a darker color. I use the dino cave skin and can barely see the boxes and lines connecting the lineage together.

[angelicdragonpuppy]

Reposting from other thread:

 

Spacing and name length wise, it seems lineages (usually) fall into one of three categories: people who used really short names to make them very compact, people who used really long names to make them very spaced out (especially for song lineages), and people who don't really care either way. What if the current spacing was used for the average length names, while a more spaced out one is used for really long names (allowing a closer resemblance to old song lineages) and a more compact one is used for really short names? I'm not sure what the cut off for each category would be, though. Also while I'm guessing it'd be on a per-generation basis, like it was before, I wouldn't be against it being evenly distributed throughout the whole lineage for consistency (ie, you have a 5g checker with really long names in the 2g section, then your whole lineage is spaced out to that length).

 

I also like Sock's idea of putting the generation in the lineage link, so for example on a dragon's page it would say "View Lineage (4th Generation)" or such.

Edited May 23, 2016 by angelicdragonpuppy

[Pokemonfan13]

The problem with the changing the spacing so that names don't have to wrap suggestion, is the wrapped names and constant spacing is a lot of what many people LIKE about the new view. Plus, if following the suggestion above, one long name would make the entire lineage spaced long, which would make things infinitely worse. And not all people who use long names in the entirety of a lineage WANT the lineage as spaced out as it would be with the names all on one line.

 

There have also been more than a few people whose complaint about the new view is how "spaced out" it is. And one of the fixes suggested is to...space things out even more?

 

The key with suggested fixes is to think of the user base as a while. Yes, you hate the new view because the names you designed to be on one line are now broken up. But do your suggested fixes only make things better for the few who feel the same as you, but make things much worse for the rest? That's why I'm fine with the suggestion to decrease the spacing for lineages with names that are only short, but object to the similar suggestion of increasing the spacing if the names are long. Being able to see more of a large lineage is a good thing. Being able to see less of a large is a bad thing for a lot of people, and increasing spacing equals being able to see less of the lineage.

 

(I'm making the assumption that the people who hate the new view for reason X are in the minority, because of the number of people who posted in the news thread that they liked the new view. This means that any changes should be tweaks, like changing how the site decides how to break a name, or decreasing the vertical spacing, not very strong aesthetic changes like making long names make the entire lineage very widely spaced)

Edited May 23, 2016 by Pokemonfan13

[StormBirdRising]

I like the lineage view the way it is now. It is a lot easier to check the lineage and it looks like a real lineage project, not like one big cramped mess for the longer lineages like it did before.

[angelicdragonpuppy]

@PF13: I actually don't mind the new lineage view terribly. My only real dislike with it is how spaced out short named lines that used to be more compact are. I'd be happy with just a smaller spacing for short names + the current spacing, but I mentioned the longer names one because I saw several people posting that they felt their song lineages were ruined due to wrapping, which a longer format would fix. Personally I'm on the fence; I have two self made song lines of my own, including one I just finished a couple weeks ago, and while I'm fairly neutral on wrapping or lack of wrapping, I do like wrapping for some of the lines I had where there would be one random long name thrown in... which leads to my point about equalizing lineages with long names thrown in. Which is worse: having the whole lineage spaced out, or having one weird gen within the whole be spaced out? I like really short lines, and I have some really long named lines I enjoy, but the lines where the length wobbled between short and really long every few generations bugged the heck out of me because they were so inconsistent looking. Granted, I still wouldn't mind going back to that system, because having only three possible widths in a lineage is still much more controlled than having a near infinite spread.

Edited May 23, 2016 by angelicdragonpuppy

[TJ09]

The only suggestion I have is changing the outline of the boxes to a darker color. I use the dino cave skin and can barely see the boxes and lines connecting the lineage together.

Dino cave did not receive any specific styling updates with the new lineage view, so whereas the other skins each have color-appropriate borders/lines, Dino cave has the color the defaults use, which probably doesn't mesh well with purple.

[HeatherMarie]

I personally really, really don't like the "wrapping" or whatever it's called. The fact that my dragon's names are cut off to form a new line. Her name is not "PreciousJewe l Dorkface Thuwed IB", and that 'l' looks really weird wrapped down to the next line. It just looks stupid. http://dragcave.net/lineage/64XSL

 

But then I see other names, like http://dragcave.net/lineage/av0p, where the longer name is just pushed completely to the 2nd line instead of half of it getting cut off. Why the difference?

[angelicdragonpuppy]

I personally really, really don't like the "wrapping" or whatever it's called. The fact that my dragon's names are cut off to form a new line. Her name is not "PreciousJewe l Dorkface Thuwed IB", and that 'l' looks really weird wrapped down to the next line. It just looks stupid. http://dragcave.net/lineage/64XSL

 

But then I see other names, like http://dragcave.net/lineage/av0p, where the longer name is just pushed completely to the 2nd line instead of half of it getting cut off. Why the difference?

Maybe it has to do with screen size or something? O___o

On my screen her name is in three tiers:

 

PreciousJewel

Dorkface Thuwed

IB

 

 

[Fuzzbucket]

I just looked at a couple of mine on mobile and I like https://dragcave.net/lineage/guffg and

https://dragcave.net/lineage/oC66H. I am on St Pat's and they look good there too

[VixenDra]

Maybe it has to do with screen size or something? O___o

On my screen her name is in three tiers:

 

PreciousJewel

Dorkface Thuwed

IB

 

PreciousJewel

Dorkface Thuwed

IB

 

- same here

 

 

 

I'd definitely make the up-down space much smaller...

and keep the vertical lines fromt he old view for the sake of generation counting, especially on messies

 

 

I definitely like the way the names now don't make the space the dragon takes in the lineage wider, this si the only thing I really like about this update

 

but I've heard it can break the word poorly so maybe there could be some ability to point where the split shoudl be? (well, adding a regular space is not a sollution because it is visible everywhere +changes the name actually... and e.g in German multi'worded' words are really supposed to not have a space... that would be incorrect as far as I know)

 

also, perhaps the font for the names in the lineage view could be smaller?

Edited May 24, 2016 by VixenDra

[NotBambi]

I just looked at a couple of mine on mobile and I like https://dragcave.net/lineage/guffg and

https://dragcave.net/lineage/oC66H. I am on St Pat's and they look good there too

So beautiful!

[Saami]

Dino cave did not receive any specific styling updates with the new lineage view, so whereas the other skins each have color-appropriate borders/lines, Dino cave has the color the defaults use, which probably doesn't mesh well with purple.

Would it be possible to have a solid background for the lineage view, like when I'm viewing my scroll?

[HawktalonOfRiverClan]

Dragons in higher gens should be grouped closer together. The effect of this lineage is completely lost after the 6th gen because the dragons are so far apart that they don't even look connected to each other and you have to scroll forever to get to the next one.

 

Also, it would be nice if dragons with long, one-word names would keep their names on one line, or at least have the names be hyphenated. Because her name looks really weird chopped up like that, like it's two words rather than one.

[Pokemonfan13]

I think a hyphen is a good compromise to the forced name breaking of long names without spaces.

 

Any opinions on breaking the name in half (or thirds if it's needed) rather than simply putting overflow on the next line? It would prevent the really strange looking single (or just a few) letter(s) sitting alone on the next line if the name is just barely too long.

[Fiona]

Rather than breaking at a specific letter count, wouldn't it be best for it to look for a space or hyphen and break there? If there's no space or hyphen then I think it should add one at the break point. (Actually, I thought TJ had set it up to break at a space, but looking at some of these I guess he didn't)

[Daydreamer09]

Not sure if this has been mentioned, but the first generation of the new lineage view REALLY needs some adjustment to the vertical spacing. There's more spacing between the dragon and it's name than the name and the next dragon below. Which makes it incredibly confusing at first glance which name applies to which sprite. Here's what I'm talking about: Example

The name above the sprites are closer and easily mistaken to account for the wrong sprite.

 

I'm also going to put these mockup ideas out there for possible consideration. Personally I don't like how the dragon names and sprites are swimming around in the new lineage style. Something to contain the information in a way would be nice.

Maybe this? Or this?

Ancestry and geneology websites normally have some similar form of boxing style to their family trees, keeping photos and corresponding names held together in family trees. I think it'd really help it visually enhance the look.

 

[Pokemonfan13]

I see what you mean about the names. That does need to be addressed.

 

I don't mind how the names and sprites are not enclosed, but if they have to be I prefer your #2.

[purplehaze]

I don't mind how the names and sprites are not enclosed, but if they have to be I prefer your #2.

And I find the #2 proposal very distracting with disconnected lines going every which way. It is hard for my old eyes to discern which lines are the "boxes" and which are the connections. #1 is much easier for me to follow.

[AGYK]

Maybe it has to do with screen size or something? O___o

Yep, Nightwalkerkey and I established this in the other thread:

Also, in the lineage view of your dragon, http://dragcave.net/lineage/QIwqf, the blusangs name is cut off and put to a new line. Granted, only one letter, but still throws it off. Do not like. Hope it isn't meant to be like that, TJ....

For what it's worth, I'm not seeing that. Screenshot.

Huh, odd... Running Chrome... http://imgur.com/aB7JOJM

 

For this particular dragon, I see two lines:

PreciousJewel

Dorkface Thuwed IB

 

-----

 

Rather than breaking at a specific letter count, wouldn't it be best for it to look for a space or hyphen and break there? If there's no space or hyphen then I think it should add one at the break point. (Actually, I thought TJ had set it up to break at a space, but looking at some of these I guess he didn't)

He did not. He has things set up with a simple span element, which apparently wraps wherever.

 

Copying from the other thread:

Might also be workable to break on spaces. A glance at the page's source suggests TJ's just using a basic span element to hold names in /lineage/ right now. If he was to change it to use wbrs on spaces, the way dragon names in the /view/ page work, that would allow browsers to line-break on spaces. Still wouldn't help with super long one-word names, as in that screenshot, but it might be a decent compromise to cover super long multi-word names and normal-length one-word names.

 

-----

 

Not sure if this has been mentioned, but the first generation of the new lineage view REALLY needs some adjustment to the vertical spacing. There's more spacing between  the dragon and it's name than the name and the next dragon below. Which makes it incredibly confusing at first glance which name applies to which sprite. Here's what I'm talking about: Example

The name above the sprites are closer and easily mistaken to account for the wrong sprite.

Agreed. Just needs some adjustments with vertical spacing imo - a bit more space between the dragons, a bit less space between a dragon and its name. Perhaps even just shifting the name a few pixels up would be enough.

 

I'm also going to put these mockup ideas out there for possible consideration. Personally I don't like how the dragon names and sprites are swimming around in the new lineage style. Something to contain the information in a way would be nice.

I like how clean and simple the lineage tree is. I would prefer not adding groupings to it. If we must, I strongly prefer your #1. #2 just doesn't look good to me. Too much clutter, I think.

[NotBambi]

~snip

I like how clean and simple the lineage tree is. I would prefer not adding groupings to it.

~snip

^^This.

[Wymsical]

My only gripe with the lineage view is that there's no line break between the bottommost part of the lineage and the ad box. Such a line break exists on other pages, and it's something I really appreciate as a rather twitchy person.

[HeatherMarie]

Okay, I see now that my problem with the wrapping names went away when I zoomed out a little bit. That takes care of that.

 

But I agree that something needs to be done about the spacing. It's just so spread out, how can you even see what generation is what?

[gigglymonkey12]

Wait...I don't get what's wrong with the spacing

http://dragcave.net/lineage/Z8O8I

I think the spacing between generation is fine. I just think the spacing for the 1st generation is a bit squashed.