New look and feel

As I haven't seen this discussed yet:

Personally I think, Parallels really uglified the GUI in RC1. I think the beta6 gui was okayish, not great but ok, whereas the RC1 one... maaan that is ugly! What I really dislike are the icons on the lower right of the application window for HD/Optical/network/USB. They were much more clearer before.

However, I don't really care about the GUI (I'am more of a Linux guy, and have just recently entered shiny MAC world, which might explain this ), and will buy Parallels Desktop anyway ( I already own a Parallels Workstation license).

However, I'd like to hear what others think about the new "polished" GUI?

Jisi

 

Agreed. I am not too bothered about it, but in terms of beauty, it has gone from bad to worse. Then again, I am running XP inside once I load it.

FWIW, I am also a licensed user. Not too bothered about the interface. Just glad that it all is coming together in terms of functionality.

 

I like the new GUI - I think it looks nicer than the previous version - or at least the icons are nicer, I still wish some of the dialogs were a little more slick.

 

Personally, I think RC1 took a giant leap in the right direction. For example:

- They implemented 'sheets' for most dialogs, which is very much expected standard Mac UI.
- the control buttons are a little more Aqua-like, which is welcomed in my book.

What I think people's knee-jerk reaction is; it's the new modern grey buttons on the bottom. Granted, this doesn't look very "mac-like". Ideally, they'd use standard-looking Mac-style buttons. But, I'm guessing they would like to stick with one set of buttons for their entire line.

 

I'm not too fond of the icon buttons, but I don't hate them. I do wish that the dialog boxes and sheets would abide by Aqua interface guidelines though.

 

I would say it has taken a step away from something which can be identified as Mac-Style. The old Beta 6 look was more Mac like.

While the look is not really important to me, I think that the Mac community is quite sensitive to look and feel and probably reluctant to use apps that don't look genuinely Mac like. Not just for aestetics, but simply because a Mac-unlike look is often (not always) a sign of a half-heartedly ported application. I'm definitely not saying that this applies to Parallels in reality, but I think a "wrong look" could be a disadvantage marketing wise.

 

I think the intent is more important than the result. Mac users were asking for a more "mac-like" look and Parallels responded with an attempt. Parallels continues to demonstrate amazing customer responsiveness.

What throws me in the RC1 look is the "vista-style" black background buttons on the VM properties page. All the other aqua-like icons, buttons, and dialog behaviors are great. Change the vista-buttons back to aqua, and I think you're very, very close to being a "native cocoa" interface.

Keep up the great work, Parallels.

 

I agree that Parallels has shown a wonderful eagerness to listen to customers. I love that!

Really the only thing I'd like to see is the layout of the windows adjusted to follow standard positioning and spacing guidelines.

 

The icon row along the bottom edge look wrong because:
a) (To my eye at least) they are not distinctive enough - which is hard disk and which is network again? I have to hover the mouse for a tool tip!
b) They look greyed out - they should be greyed out if eg CD is not connected, not when they are available?

On the bigger user interface issue, I find the terminal layout rather unusual (not bad, just strangely non conventional). My main tool bar is down the right side of the window. We have tool bars along the top and down the left side but never down the right. To me it feels clumsy (rude?) reaching over and across the guest OS to click Suspend for example... just a psychological thing and not terribly significant.

Personally I would like to run XP as an application (Windows in a Window) and as such would prefer it to run in a smaller more space efficient design similar to other Mac applications. That probably means a button bar along the top edge replacing that fat bars at right and bottom.

Just my 5c - either way this is still the coolest software so far this millenium

 

I went into the app package to pull up the nib to try prettifying the UI, but there is no nib. Looks like they're building the UI by hand at runtime instead. Strange.

 

I like the route where the current UI is heading. In fact, I like everything except for the VM-related buttons on the bottom. They look so out of place.

Also, I still wish the start/pause/stop buttons could have 'mini-icon' mode, which then can be placed on the bottom of the VM.

 

Agree. Here's a thought: place them in the host menubar ala MenuMeters. That will shave off the wasted space at the bottom of the Window (assuming you are not in FS mode), make it Mac-like and very convenient.

 

I don't expect miracles. They are using QT for the interface, and QT != Aqua. It's close, but it will always have quirks that are the result of code reuse and a single UI toolkit for Mac, Windows and Linux (KDE).