Bitcoin Forum

Bitcoin => Development & Technical Discussion => Topic started by: acous on November 28, 2010, 01:42:00 AM



Title: Mac client UI
Post by: acous on November 28, 2010, 01:42:00 AM
Hi all. I read about Bitcoin in the newspaper yesterday1 and was quite excited! I've been interested in the idea of alternative/open currencies for a while but never came across Bitcoin before. I downloaded the mac client and have started gathering blocks.

The client seems solid and functional. Visually however, it appears slightly dated and could use space more efficiently. So while waiting for blocks to arrive I fooled around with the UI in photoshop. Here's what I've come up with so far: http://cl.ly/3C0b3N3q1F3Q122F2Q0X (http://cl.ly/3C0b3N3q1F3Q122F2Q0X). Hopefully it's pretty self-explanatory. The tickbox in the bottom right is for generating coins. Clicking the balance slides out a transaction history (TBD as I become more familiar with transactions).

So firstly, any thoughts on the pic? Secondly, how can I contact the mac dev? It would be cool if he was open to these suggestions. If not I'll have to try and figure out xcode :).

1.http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2010/1126/1224284180416.html (http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2010/1126/1224284180416.html)


Title: Re: Mac client UI
Post by: wumpus on November 28, 2010, 09:18:15 AM
You could make a full native GUI and make it communicate with bitcoin(d) client through the RPC (JSON) protocol (though I'm not sure whether that already offers all the calls you need to make a GUI)

In the main client, there is no support for pluggable GUIs at all. The current GUI (wxWindows) is used on all systems.


Title: Re: Mac client UI
Post by: balboah on November 28, 2010, 03:11:18 PM
Hi all. I read about Bitcoin in the newspaper yesterday1 and was quite excited! I've been interested in the idea of alternative/open currencies for a while but never came across Bitcoin before. I downloaded the mac client and have started gathering blocks.

The client seems solid and functional. Visually however, it appears slightly dated and could use space more efficiently. So while waiting for blocks to arrive I fooled around with the UI in photoshop. Here's what I've come up with so far: http://cl.ly/3C0b3N3q1F3Q122F2Q0X (http://cl.ly/3C0b3N3q1F3Q122F2Q0X). Hopefully it's pretty self-explanatory. The tickbox in the bottom right is for generating coins. Clicking the balance slides out a transaction history (TBD as I become more familiar with transactions).

So firstly, any thoughts on the pic? Secondly, how can I contact the mac dev? It would be cool if he was open to these suggestions. If not I'll have to try and figure out xcode :).

1.http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2010/1126/1224284180416.html (http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/finance/2010/1126/1224284180416.html)

Really like the layout, a lot more macish.
But it would probably require cocoa rather than wxWindows to look native like that and I don't think the devs priorities the frontend right now. Especially not for the mac as those versions lag behind the rest


Title: Re: Mac client UI
Post by: acous on November 28, 2010, 03:15:06 PM
I didn't realize it used a cross platform UI toolkit. My UI idea would almost certainly not work with that. Perhaps some day I will download the source and play around with the GUI for my own personal use... in the mean time I will keep an eye out for other ways to contribute to the community.

Thanks for the heads up :)