"Hide sidebars" option on hamburger menu for convenience on tablets & phones

[jbudd]

Background

The Node-red editor is not very usable on a phone or small tablet.

It is particularly hard to hide the left and right columns.
If you try and hold/drag the right column handle it generally moves the node underneath it instead.

The left hand column does not even display a handle

Proposal

Add a new option on the hamburger menu "Hide/Show Sidebars"

If you do manage to hide the sidebars, there is a reasonable amount of editor real estate in view.

[E1cid]

If you click menu hamburger, and in view you can unselect sidebars or palette.

[mbonani]

There is an option in the menu to toggle sidebars. It is in View. But it's virtually impossible to navigate the menu using a touchscreen device.

[jbudd]

Oh yes those are indeed submenu options.

It is really easy to open the menu by touching the hamburger.

Unfortunately it is nearly impossible to open submenus; touching on "View" closes the menu.

An option on the top level menu would improve small screen usability.

[E1cid]

@jbudd

Unfortunately it is nearly impossible to open submenus; touching on "View" closes the menu.

I press and hold view, this opens a chrome context menu, then i click back button and sub menus are available, Samsung phone
Or
I can press view slide to sidebar and then quick release and press.
Or
Samsung has a virtual mouse pad with cursor. There must be other android virtual mouse pads to.

[jbudd]

@E1cid

I press and hold view, this opens a chrome context menu, then i click back button and sub menus are available, Samsung phone

Yes Firefox too. But this proposal is to improve the small screen usability.

@E1cid

Or
I can press view slide to sidebar and then quick release and press.

I can't even parse that, never mind emulate it.

@E1cid

Or
Samsung has a virtual mouse pad with cursor.

I was hoping to increase the screen area available to the editor, not decrease it.

But I can tell that despite your

@E1cid

I can not select a junction, i don't use them anyway.

you don't see any value in this proposal.

[E1cid]

@jbudd

I was hoping to increase the screen area available to the editor, not decrease it.

The mouse pad is transparent and is easy to turn off. I can also use magnifier and move magnifier with mouse pad.

If anybody wants to edit on a small screen (crazy idea) then add a mouse and usb dongle. Becomes very easy at that point, apart fro the screen size.

I edit on a Android box using 55inch screen with mouse and keyboard. I have no issues, can even use junction nodes if i choose to..

[bwims]

I would like to support this request. Despite the assertion from @E1cid above, it is virtually impossible to select a junction node, a fact that he admits elsewhere.

[ralphwetzel]

@bwims

virtually impossible to select a junction node

Do you have a proposal how to improve the situation?

[jbudd]

@E1cid

I edit on a Android box using 55inch screen with mouse and keyboard. I have no issues, can even use junction nodes if i choose to..

Congratulations, that's a very impressive set-up.
It is surely not relevant to a discussion about using a phone or tablet to access Node-red though?
99.999% of Android phones do not have a 55" screen, mouse and keyboard.

But wait, maybe it is relevant...
It shows that Node-red can be accessed from an Android, it's just the difficulty of using the touch interface and keyboard that gets in the way.
This little proposal will not by any means solve all the usability issues, the difficulty of selecting a junction for instance.
It is aimed at making the hamburger menu easier to use on a small touch screen.

I don't think this little change would make the user interface any worse for those with mice and keyboards.

[E1cid]

@jbudd

Congratulations, that's a very impressive set-up.
It is surely not relevant to a discussion about using a phone or tablet to access Node-red though?
99.999% of Android phones do not have a 55" screen, mouse and keyboard.

It has relevance to using a tablet or phone as you can do the same with a high % of android devices as you can add a keyboard and mouse and cast screen to most modern TV's.

The only difficulty i have using a touch screen is junction nodes, again i have no issues using menu on touch screen, but if the developers wish to clutter the menu for edge cases, who am i to say no.

[E1cid]

@bwims

I would like to support this request. Despite the assertion from @E1cid above, it is virtually impossible to select a junction node, a fact that he admits elsewhere.

I admit it is impossible on a touch screen to use junctions, but not if you add a mouse. Please don't misquote me.

p.s. This topic is about hamburger menu not junction nodes.

[jbudd]

@bwims

I would like to support this request. ... it is virtually impossible to select a junction node

This request does not address usability of junctions, but maybe they would benefit from a change (too?)

Regarding junctions and drawing wires on my phone:

• I can insert a junction into a blank space by long press, add, junction. Fairly easy.
• I can select a junction by touching it. Fairly easy.
• I can drag the junction to move it, including dropping it in a wire.
• I cannot find "delete and reconnect" on the phone. This option is probably even more important on a small screen since the other end of the wires is likely to be out of sight.
• It is very hard to get the in/out circles to show up on a junction. A long press sometimes does this and sometimes shows the popup options.
• It is very hard to draw a wire from the junction. I think this is because the in and out circles are just too close together for my finger. Actually it's quite hard to draw any wire on the phone screen if the node has outputs close together (eg a switch)

And a final observation on junctions, I managed to get a wire connected to the junction at one end and floating free at the other.

[bwims]

How is this mis-quoting you?

How to change flows from a tablet touchscreen?

I can not select a junction, i don't use them anyway. As a workaround you could use change nodes with no rules added, and in appearance deselect label checkbox.

You literally said "I can not select a junction" did you not?

[bwims]

"Hide sidebars" option on hamburger menu for convenience on tablets & phones

Do you have a proposal how to improve the situation?

Possibly something involving dragging a circle with an associated mouse pointer ? (The old Viewranger app on Android used to let you draw GPS routes that way.)

I think it might be a good idea for the guys who develop the screen interface spending some time using touch screens to get a feeling of how difficult it is at present.

Disclaimer: I know this topic is about the hamburger menu, but the general ability to use the system on a touchpad without access to a keyboard/mouse is extremely limited.

[bwims]

I guess it depends on screen resolution whether or not you can select a junction. I am using a Samsung T580 and have had no luck so far. I think the answer may be entering a pointer mode with an offset arrow and a dragging area. I seem to remember the old touchscreen Teamviewer had something like that, possibly with an area on screen where you could enable / disable.

[TotallyInformation]

@bwims

I think it might be a good idea for the guys who develop the screen interface spending some time using touch screens to get a feeling of how difficult it is at present.

While this is logical and desirable. We have to remember that there are very few people with any capacity to work on Node-RED core and there is a large backlog of ideas. I think that if there are people willing to work on it, the core team would probably be happy to get PR's from contributors accordingly. But in terms of priorities - is this the highest priority of thing to work on?

[bwims]

Yeah, I hear you. But there has been an effort to provide for touchscreens, so no good deed goes unpunished as they say - give people functionality, and they will want it to work. The simplest thing would be to say "touchscreens without a mouse are unsupported! "

I've already come to the conclusion that I need my Microsoft Surface Wedge mouse around at all times...

[E1cid]

@bwims

You literally said "I can not select a junction" did you not?

As the post you refer to is not about the hamburger menu topic. You did post you were confused, I thought I posted to clear your confusion.