Piece Organization

[Lalror]

One thing that is a big problem, but can also be easily fixed, it piece organization in LDD. With some of the recent updates in LDD, it is now very hard for me to find the pieces that I am looking for. It is true that after a while, you eventually get somewhat used to it and can remember where most things are, but the truth is that the current system is broken. Forgive me if I should be posting this in one of the update threads, but I felt that this is something that is important, and could be easily handled by Lego, and I wanted to speak out about it.

The main problem with the system is simply the groups that the bricks have been put into. Currently, we have two different boxes for minifig accessories, which also makes it harder to find your normal minifig parts such as hair. There is currently an instance of where the main icon for a collection of pieces, is a piece that is in a different folder. I honestly think that any one of us could organize the many pieces in LDD in a more user friendly way. Even if they were simply organized by size, it would be more efficient than what it currently is. Seriously, for minifigs split up the head pieces, accessories, body pieces, etc, its not all that hard to do. Its not all that hard to organize a bunch of pieces, so I am hoping that this issue gets fixed.

On one last note, if Lego cannot find a successful system that works for a majority, they should at least give us the ability to create out own groups, and move bricks from section to section to better fit our individual needs.

If anybody else has any suggestions please comment below. Thanks for reading, I hope this message will get to Lego somehow.

~Lalror

[Superkalle]

From what I've understood, the organisation of bricks in LDD is not done by the LDD developers, but by something called DesignLab. It is an organisation within LEGO of experienced designers, managers and other wise persons that together decided how to manage the LEGO System (i.e. which bricks should be active, allowed connections, color palette, taxonomy etc). Apparently they are now experimenting with a new way of organizing the bricks, which is then automatically transfered down to LDD without the LDD designers having much to say about. Personally I think it's a pity that TLG makes these changes in a way that affects thousands of LDD users who get hit by something new without even a warning. I mean, finding bricks has got to be one of the core features of the whole software. But let's keep our fingers crossed that this will turn out to something good.

Personally, I think it would be great if TLG could unveile the underlying classification schema/rules, so that it's easier to figure out what goes where. For the most part it's naturally understandable, but not always, and off course it's for those parts you look the most

[DLuders]

@ Lalror: Are you wanting the hundred+ parts categories listed in the Bricklink Reference Catalog? I'm not sure whether that would be practical on a Graphical User Interface (GUI), because the icons would clutter-up the menu too much.

[nemo]

Personally I think it's a pity that TLG makes these changes in a way that affects thousands of LDD users who get hit by something new without even a warning.

And from a technical point of view it's disappointing that these palettes are not user-editable.

It would be simple to allow the user to drag or copy bricks from palette to palette, or indeed to add more palettes.

[Calabar]

I think TLG don't want a user can personalize the palette because want that LDD is immediately ready and easy to use, and avoid situations such as:

- necessity of modify the palette after every palette update

- difficulty to work on the LDD installation if not in your computer

I think that a better disposition of the bricks would be the best solution.

But probably the problem is that they dispose the pieces looking at the best disposition for the DBM palette, not the whole palette.

[Lalror]

Personally, I think it would be great if TLG could unveile the underlying classification schema/rules, so that it's easier to figure out what goes where.

I am sure that Lego has some organization system that is the same throughout the company (it would be mandatory) but with the large amount of pieces and colors I think it would be good for Lego to release a piece and color catalog for reference. This would also provide non-official Lego sites such as bricklink to have better corresponding names.

@ Lalror: Are you wanting the hundred+ parts categories listed in the Bricklink Reference Catalog? I'm not sure whether that would be practical on a Graphical User Interface (GUI), because the icons would clutter-up the menu too much.

No.

[nemo]

I think TLG don't want a user can personalize the palette because want that LDD is immediately ready and easy to use, and avoid situations such as:

- necessity of modify the palette after every palette update

New bricks get added to the Lego appointed palettes (and could have a yellow background to show that they are new!). User can then move them.

- difficulty to work on the LDD installation if not in your computer

All PCs support multiple users, so as long as the customised palette setup is stored in the user's AppData directory then users' changes would not affect each other.

[AndyC]

New bricks get added to the Lego appointed palettes (and could have a yellow background to show that they are new!). User can then move them.

How long do they stay yellow? What happens with pieces like he chain link that are removed temporarily and then restored in some future brick set? Are you limited to moving within the original categories or can you create new ones? Where do group icons come from? If I move the piece used for the icon out of that category and put it in another, what happens to the icon? Will the UI cope if a user puts all the bricks in a single category? Will it cope if every piece gets put in a separate category? Should you be allowed to rearrange pieces within a category or is the ordering still based on size? What happens to the pieces in a category if a user deletes a category? What happens if a user deleted a category that pieces are supposed to go in for a new brick update?

Adding a "simple" feature is often a lot more complicated than it sounds once you realise how much thought should go into the design. I've barely even scratched the surface of what needs to be considered for adding a feature like that. Particularly when it directly affects the core purpose of the product. I'm not saying it wouldn't be useful, I just don't think it's quite as easy as it seems on the surface.

[Calabar]

New bricks get added to the Lego appointed palettes (and could have a yellow background to show that they are new!). User can then move them.

AndyC answer well about that. I add:

- at every palette update you have to look for new pieces an move that, or you'll find similar pieces in different categories.

- the system that manage the palette have to be reimagined.

All PCs support multiple users, so as long as the customised palette setup is stored in the user's AppData directory then users' changes would not affect each other.

I mean the opposite!

A user with a personalized palette will be productive only working on his/her LDD.

I think a better organization of the palette would be the best solution.

We need more smaller groups: for example the group that contains the minifig parts is too big and confused. We need a group with minifig parts (torso, legs, hair, ...), one with minifig wears (hats, armors, cloths, ...), one with minifig hand accessories (or two, one for weapons, one for other objects), and so on...

Some predefined filter inside each group could be useful too: you open a group and few buttons appears, so tou can click on them to filter objects. For example, the weapon group can have "arcs", "melee", "gunshot weampons", "sci-fi weapons", etc...

[nemo]

How long do they stay yellow?

Until selected.

What happens with pieces like he chain link that are removed temporarily and then restored in some future brick set?

They disappear, then reappear, with a yellow background!

Are you limited to moving within the original categories or can you create new ones? Where do group icons come from?

You could create new palettes, and you’d choose the palette icon from the available range in that version of LDD.

Same thin If I move the piece used for the icon out of that category and put it in another, what happens to the icon?

That palette disappears. When you create a new palette you choose which of the palette icons to use.

Will the UI cope if a user puts all the bricks in a single category?

Yes. The minifigure accessory palette is very nearly there already!

Will it cope if every piece gets put in a separate category?

These are simple scalability questions which a competent programmer naturally considers... apropos of nothing.

Should you be allowed to rearrange pieces within a category or is the ordering still based on size?

You should be able to reorder.

What happens to the pieces in a category if a user deletes a category?

You can only move the bricks out of a palette, you can’t “delete” it.

What happens if a user deleted a category that pieces are supposed to go in for a new brick update?

It comes back with those new bricks in it. With yellow backgrounds!

Adding a "simple" feature is often a lot more complicated than it sounds once you realise how much thought should go into the design.

Really? You should see how complicated it gets once you have to express it in code.

I've barely even scratched the surface of what needs to be considered for adding a feature like that. Particularly when it directly affects the core purpose of the product. I'm not saying it wouldn't be useful, I just don't think it's quite as easy as it seems on the surface.

It’s certainly not a three line change (of which two are a comment).

Edited September 15, 2011 by nemo

[Tontus]

I may be jumping the gun here, but I just took a quick peek at the assets.lif file using wordpad. It appears that the top of the file is a list of all the pieces with data for each piece. Part of the data is the group it appears in. It would be really annoying, but in theory you should be able to manually edit the group data for each piece. It might be annoying managing 2000 pieces that way, but should be possible.

For someone more skilled than me, it shouldn't be all that hard to come up with a program to edit the file graphically.

I should also mention that if you don't already know to backup files before messing with them, then you probably shouldn't try.

[Lalror]

Welcome to Eurobricks Tontus, thats a good idea, and would work in theory. I think though that the work required to find the pieces, the group, and then try to make them correspond, for more than two thousand bricks would be a little tedious though.

I like the idea of highlighting new bricks, but rather than a yellow background, just have a splash screen that shows the new features in the latest update. Maybe also provide a temporary collection of all the new bricks which you could then move, or have automatically placed in other groups. All of these a good ideas though.

[nemo]

I just took a quick peek at the assets.lif file using wordpad.

That’s not really the best tool for the job, but rest assured that the .lif file format is fully understood (it’s quite simple).

However, currently it’s a bit of a trek to move a brick – each brick says which group it is in, then various groups are merged under a single icon. (I’m going to stop using the word ‘palette’ as that has a slightly different meaning within the Assets.lif structure).

So although there are group icons like the one attached, they actually contain bricks from multiple groups for which there are no icons.

This means there are a number of files within the .lif that would have to change just to move one brick. Which is why we were discussing LDD having user-customisation so this huge chunk of data doesn’t need to be changed to move WALL ELEMENT 1x2x1 back into the group that bears its icon!!!

Edited September 16, 2011 by nemo

[Tontus]

I agree 100%, the ideal solution would be adding that capability to the program. Until that happens, I'm all for user created mods.

I wasn't aware though that it wouldn't be as simple as changing the group name associated with a particular brick. Oh well, it's probably easier to just memorize where everything is located anyway.

[alienwar9]

I know I've posted it before, but it's too obvious and funny and I thought it could help the argument

THIS is why the piece organization should be reconsidered. Seriously, that just looks bad for LDD.

[nemo]

it's too obvious and funny

Yes, it was to that travesty I was referring. It had me very confused after that update.

To be fair, as various brick groups are merged before being shown in those tabs, it is not a given that changing a brick group will move it to a different tab.

But even a little QA would have made a lot of difference here.