Shadowed Unit Frames

Shadowed · 05/05/09, 5:41 PM

The main focus of SUF is having a simplistic configuration, while maintaining flexibility that the vast majority of users care about. While you aren't going to be able to set that you want the health bar to be exactly 3.14 pixels outside of the health bar, you can set change options that you actually care about such as bar height, ordering, frame height and so on. All configuration can be done on multiple units at the same time through the global configuration, meaning if you want to set the height of player and target frames to 50, but then you want to set the height of targettarget and targettargettarget to 30 you can easily do that with changing only two options, instead of having to do it four times for each unit.

For people who want to tweak every single setting, you can enable advanced configuration which will show extra settings for those who have to tweak every little thing they have to. However, you do not need to enable this by default, and most people should not need to enable them.

Currently, only one layout is included by default (The one seen in the screenshot), but I will include a few more once I have the layout manager in.

Beta versions can be found on Shadowed Unit Frames - WoW AddOns - WowAce.com
Live versions on Shadowed Unit Frames : WoWInterface Downloads : Unit Mods or Shadowed Unit Frames - Addons - Curse

SeanDamnit · 05/05/09, 6:50 PM

I think most unit frames start out with that philosophy: easy to configure, but very configurable. And they all end up the same: what looks like a big mess of intimidating options. There is just too much you can do with unit frames to make them both easy to configure and very configurable.

--In my opinion, all unit frame's configuration options are pretty simple once you understand how they work, and it's very intimidating at first. The best thing I can recommend for yours is good, clear documentation and tutorials on how to do what.
--Also, X-Perl is so popular because it comes ready out of the box. Having 1 or more pre made layouts immediately available would be great.
--Finally the most important thing: make it as light-weight as possible. Goes without saying I guess.

Best of luck to you. I probably won't be using your frame though, I'm one of those weirdos that uses default UI...

Kuosi · 05/05/09, 6:51 PM

Sounds like my type of uf's! Pitbull4 kills my comp in 25mans, aguf lacks features, stuf has way too much to configure and I'm just too lazy to make my own ouf layout out of scratch.

Ajuga · 05/06/09, 4:07 AM

Originally Posted by Kuosi

Sounds like my type of uf's! Pitbull4 kills my comp in 25mans, aguf lacks features, stuf has way too much to configure and I'm just too lazy to make my own ouf layout out of scratch.

PB4 is in alpha (or beta?) and hasn't been optimized yet.

Good luck with the project, Shadowed.

Winco · 05/06/09, 7:05 AM

I've personally moved on from Pitbull, to Stuf. The lack of DogTags is a bit irritating, though it has its own imitation, but not nearly to the same extent. Some sort of Discord UF with DogTags would be very nice.

--Also, X-Perl is so popular because it comes ready out of the box. Having 1 or more pre made layouts immediately available would be great.
--Finally the most important thing: make it as light-weight as possible. Goes without saying I guess.

Though I heavily despise X-Perl, it is a good point. Discord UF, and Stuf have (had) pretty awful default UIs (more so for Discord/Stuf), and would take an hour or so to make anything remotely attractive, but with the level of options available, would usually deliver great results. Anchoring would also be great. Not just between frames but also frame elements.

DekUF sounds great, or WinUF, honestly.

I'll keep an eye on this, as I am quite a whore when it comes to Unit Frames.

Duilliath · 05/06/09, 12:37 PM

I'm keenly interested. To be honest, I'm personally not interested in some of the fancier stuff that, say, a Pitbull can do, such as the Portraits or the 'interactions' lines. I'd gladly take a more bare-bones approach if it can tone down the hefty demands.

One thing I'd like to see would be an option for a Vertical approach. I tried something similar with Pitbull, but it was rather messy. I was aiming for something not unlike DaHUD.

As one of my more played characters is a Death Knight, I'd appreciate a good Rune system, if possible.

Lastly, I'd appreciate a way to make certain debuffs stand out more, not unlike what Auracle does.

As to the name, here's some options: May B UF. Hooved Unit Frame Finale. Beyond Unit Frames: the Final Frontier. Okay, so I'm a sucker for poor puns.

//edit: I quite like the above suggestion for pre-mades. Perhaps, once you reach alpha/beta stage, have a few select people muck about with it and save their settings for easy import.

Krames · 05/06/09, 1:28 PM

Definitely going as lightweight as possible is probably one of the more important things to shoot for, after it gets working the way you want it.

I've been using Pitbull lately because i'm too lazy to code my own oUF layout. Having a very easy to use configuration window is definitely a big plus. Having it organized and labeled in ways where it's easier to get something done definitely helps. I'll post up some ideas I have once i get my creative juices working.

Name wise, put a touch of yourself in it. Whether it be your main or a preferred nickname or something. Don't have it sound too outrageous, but make sure to make it original and yours.

Duncan · 05/06/09, 8:32 PM

I think most people would stick with something very lightweight, but still completely customizable like oUF, if it just had an ingame config that loads on demand (like STUF options).

Krames · 05/06/09, 8:50 PM

There are a few oUF layouts, not many, but a few that have in-game configuration. It's just adding the .xml config file.

TimWischmeier · 05/07/09, 4:35 AM

You were asking for suggestions, so this is one of the rare situations where wishlisting on EJ is ok

.

This comes from a Healer perspektive.

I do like to have lots of options, but I don't like to have to go through them all to set up my uf. So it would be really to either have some helpful presets or even have a wizard kind of thing. It would help in arranging things ("Put the anchor, choose orientation, spaces, sorting and your raidframes will be placed automatically).

When it comes to buffs and debuffs, I rarely saw a good solution. Often it's cluttered or nothing. It would be nice if there was something like a debuff / buff history you can use to build a whitelist and / or blacklist, similar to Elkano's Buff Bar's functionality.

As a Paladin who often heals mainly MTs, it would be nice to have an additional set of frames where you can put user targets "on the fly" (meaning: being easily changed before each boss fight).

Prinsesa · 05/07/09, 5:43 AM

I'd like to throw in a wish for premade configurations as well, which was basically XPerl's main draw for me. It's very intimidating to load Pitbull for the first time and be assaulted by a dozen different bars, all in the middle of the screen.

Also, as long as it's not too feature-heavy, it would be nice to only have to deal with one addon folder.

Shadowed · 05/07/09, 10:35 AM

How many default configurations it comes with will mostly depend on if anyone supplies them, the basic default UI type positioning will be included, and possibly another that puts the unit frames slightly below the character. Since it will include a way to export layouts, I'll include a few by default if I get any good ones form people.

Configuration wizard is an interesting idea, will look into that once I have it working.

It's definitely not going to be the kind of configuration that you can get in Discord/Stuf, while I do want it to be as flexible as possible I'm trying to avoid doing it by simply adding 20 new configuration options to achieve it.

While it is using tags, it's not using DogTags that's way too complicated of a system for what I want. The tags it comes with will be the same as you get from oUF, and for people who want to make it more flexible they can add custom tags through the configuration.

I'll be adding basic aura filtering (Only show your auras, only show ones you can cast, enlarge your auras slightly) but it's not going to include a blacklist/whitelist feature, if you need that much control over auras, you're likely better off using a buff mod built to handle that.

Not going to include new frames that you can change who they target, those aren't really unit frames and should still be done by another mod.

And yes, not going to make it have 20 module folders, it'll just be the one main one.

Winco · 05/07/09, 9:18 PM

Sounds like I should just bite the bullet and try oUF, I've put it off in the past due to its configuration being all through LUA editing and not ingame configuration. Especially if you're not planning to go to the level of Discord/Stuf, unfortunately. I'm still very interested in seeing the results, though.

Shadowed · 05/07/09, 11:49 PM

Originally Posted by Winco

Sounds like I should just bite the bullet and try oUF, I've put it off in the past due to its configuration being all through LUA editing and not ingame configuration. Especially if you're not planning to go to the level of Discord/Stuf, unfortunately. I'm still very interested in seeing the results, though.

I won't know exactly how much configuration it will have until beta when I start to get feedback on what exactly people don't like/want in the options. What I can say for now, is that if the mod needs the same number of options that Stuf does to achieve what 99% of the users want, I'll consider the mod to be a failure on my part of designing it.

Don't really think that people need as many options as they think they do, but will find out once beta starts.

[edit]

Here's a better example, you won't be able to set the x/y axis of portraits and health/mana/etc bars (You will be able to set offsets for text), if you want to change the bar ordering you change the ordering not the axis, if you want the health bar on the right you just change it to be on the right. In that sense, you have less configuration, but the majority of the interfaces I've seen don't do anything that would require being able to have the portrait or bars clip off of the main frame.

If you really want to be able to make the portrait clip off the main frame, then oUF or Stuf is likely a better option thought.

Ajuga · 05/08/09, 4:48 AM

Have you considered what designs/layouts should be achievable with your UF addon? A new approach could be reusing the Blizzard UFs and expanding upon them; larger health and power bars, more indicators/icons etc.

Generally, in great looking UI screenshots, the layout of Action Bars, Minimap, Timers are changed to match the layout of the Unit Frames. However with a UF addon that keeps the spirit of the Blizzard UI you wont have to worry about all the other elements matching.