I wanted to start an open discussion on an
OpenCPN mode optimized for touch
screen, and what exactly this might mean in terms of the UI design. This thread is not, in any way, to be critical of the
current UI which works great with mouse+keyboard
navigation - this is purely to think about what is needed for a touch
screen implementation.
Why am I thinking about this? I'm involved in helping upgrade some of the electronics/nav for my son's Sea Scout
Boat. They
current have a PC touchscreen
monitor at the
helm for the
chartplotter PC, which is running an ancient version of TheCapn. We need to update that PC and get some newer
software that supports
AIS.
Of course my first thought was - hey, we can just upgrade to
OpenCPN, but I think the touchscreen imposes some technical limitations with doing so.
Offhand I can think of the following challenges:
No right click - This is a pretty fundamental requirement in the current UI design. It's needed for getting
AIS data, activating routes, working with waypoints, vector chart object query, etc.
No keyboard - There is probably an onscreen keyboard available in the O/S, but I look at that as more a workaround - as supporting this directly allows much tighter integration. Some thoughts: Exporting GPX routes could have an "autoname" option for the filename, routes could simply be numbered by default (like waypoints already are).
I'm not too worried about things like the configuration editor, as that can always be done directly on the PC, which is in the nav room (this is a 95' former Coast Guard
Cutter - so it is literally a room
)
Any other ideas and thoughts?