Feature Idea: assignable cable colors and GUI customization

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#1

I was a dummy in another thread, but the UI conversation did give me a feature request idea.

I think it would be awesome to be able to have assignable color coded cables in the GUI.

If I am running several pedals into the output ports on the GUI, it can get a little chaotic trying to identify what cable is running from what pedal at first glance when attempting to edit the signal chain.

Down the road, it would be cool to be able to assign cable colors so you can immediately identify which pedal you are addressing when making edits to the signal chain.

Low tier request, as core functionality is far more important than UI.

Another request for the UI is the ability to apply themes to the GUI at some point if possible.

I know absolutely nothing about coding, so I have zero idea on if this is even a possibility at some point

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#2

One issue I see here is if/how this would be saved in the pedalboard and what would happen when someone else opens this (and with the theming: if the themes conflict in some way).

It’s a simple request but could have quite some consequences.

Also in terms of accessibility, users with color blindness could possibly not even see the cables any more! All of this are things that need to be considered when changing up color schemes and theming.

But I agree it could make a complicated patch a lot easier to read if there is a bit more distinction between signal chains.

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#3

Perhaps instead of “themes” maybe more of a user applied “cosmetic skin” on their local system?

That way all boards would still be the standard board, but the customization of the UI elements is totally up to each individual.

I’ve dabbled a little bit with some Linux distro’s before, so I may be able to describe exactly what I mean. It’ll be a rough example because it’s not a 1 to 1 for coding stuff, but it’ll be close enough.

I’ll imagine that the MOD platform is Linux mint.

Everyone can download that, the OS itself is created and is offered standard with the Cinnamon UI.

In this instance, the GUI we have on the mod platform is the standard “cinnamon”.

However, you still have the freedom to install gnome 2, KDE, xfce, or another UI altogether.

Regardless of what you choose your local UI, Linux mint is still Linux mint.

Now each of those UI’s obviously come with different work flows, which we obviously don’t want to implement that added headache.

I am most interested in having some control over the UI design on the user end.

Open box was my favorite UI to use on my Linux installs because I could customize my entire desktop colorway, and create a really clean desktop that I enjoyed looking at that had minimal resource usage.

The cables could also fall under this. Have a default color, but let us change the cable color on the user end.

That way when everything gets uploaded and shared, the boards themselves are universal, and each user would have the ability to “trick out” their board in whatever way they want while they’re working with them.

In regards to color blindness, that’s a good point that I hadn’t considered, but I think having the ability to customize the local GUI colors or design might actually be useful with that situation, as each user would be able to change the interface according to their needs.

Like I said, I don’t know anything about the coding, nor do I know if mod platform is actually capable of addressing this, but I thought about this for a bit last night and this was the best explanation I could think of.

#4

The OS analogy makes sense but seems rather complex.

My take on this would be a user-configurable mapping of lets say five cable colours. In the pedalboard builder the user could then set each cable type to a number configured beforehand. Visually impaired users could either not make use of the system (i.e. by having all slots with the same colour) or use an appropriate colour scale.

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#5

Ah, yeah the Linux comparison was mostly to address the pedal board GUI customization rather than the cable color stuff. I edited my title to reflect the contents.

A TL;DR to the Linux comparison is “let me get dlc skins for my pedalboards, bro”

The cable colors customization seems like it would be far easier to implement, and your idea sounds like a logical solution to me

#6

-+1 to this - Cable colours, or at least when you select a pedal, highlight the cables that connect from it, when they’re in a bundle going into a pedal currently, it can be really hard to see where they go sometimes.
-Also, the ability to label pedals and/or name functions - in particular with switches and CV modules - to change the text on the module or something, as its hard to track when you have a few of them.
-Being able to multi-select to move stuff around! Let me select a group of pedals and move them together, maybe even to store them as a group and minimise them to save visual space?
-Disable the default for outputs to double up and connect to stereo inputs - almost every time I have to undo this (or make it a keyboard function to disable this if you haven’t already?)
-Maybe show a visual indicator on the system to show where live signal is flowing? Sometimes it’s easy to work out what you’ve connected incorrectly when you don’t hear any audio.

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#7

On this one do you mean on the assignments? If yes, you can do it over the advanced settings.

The rest I mapped in our request list. We will soon organize all of these requests.
Thanks :slight_smile:

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#8

Hi Jon, not quite. So the Advanced tab does work for certain functions. But I couldn’t see where to rename aspects of a utility - so for example, I can name the function knob on a 2-way switch. But I can’t seem to label the ports, they’re still Port 1/Port 2. If I’ve missed something then please do show me where I can do this. I feel like it’s probably user error rather than something missing from the pedal

#9

ok. Gotcha. You are correct.
You can name the assignment, but not the different options that it controls (if that makes sense).
I would say that this needs to be considered based on each plugin, no?
Because it makes a lot of sense for a switch box for example but doesn’t make a lot for example for a knob sweeping between values.

#10

Totally agree, it would have to be per-device, or maybe some devices have them set as read-only, and some are open?
It’s only ever an issue if you have a complicated pedalboard, and part of that can be mitigated by the user just designing it more simply!

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#11

I had a thought similar to @whosagoodwizard regarding storing pedals together as a group. My idea stems from the CV Tutorial on the Wiki. The very last image of the two mono Tube Drivers with the CVs set up to control the parameters of both at the same time game me the idea that it would be cool to be able to “box” that all together with the 3 dials of the 3 CV units on the front of the box. This would reduce the clutter of 5 pedals down to 1. I struggle with screen clutter already and feel it would be nice to group things together into something you could double click to get back into, but otherwise is tucked away keeping the screen clean.

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