hey there,
my announcement screen is flooded mostly with the same message all over again, just caused by different dwarfs. they are consolidated sometimes when they are caused by the same dwarf in succession, but when there are 2 with the same problem iterating that doesn't work. this might also be useful for many other messages. like when i order to produce thousand pieces of X i don't actually want to be notified about every freakin single time my legendary mason, craftsdwarf, whatever created a masterwork. same for bugs, the announcement screen doesn't need to be flooded with messages that some soldier canceled pickup because the bolts are in a bin... if i care, i will take care. but if i don't, flooding the announcement screen doesn't make me care either.
so i would prefer that there are just messages without the dwarf, maybe a number how many dwarf complain and a list of the complaining dwarfs/causes on the right side of the screen, when i select the message, so it has the layout of the justice screen. well, if one dwarf cries for seeds a and another for seeds b... there might be a third split for details of the message. the right side might be split horizontally and the detail message could appear in the lower half, so it looks like that if the first message would be selected:
_____________________________________________
| Announcements |
_____________________________________________
| * canceled plant (2) | >dwarf 1<, dwarf 2|
| animal slaughtered (3)| |
| given birth (10) | |
| more |===================|
| messages |dwarf 1: needs |
| here | plump helmet |
| ... | spawn |
---------------------------------------------
and like that if the second message is selected:
_____________________________________________
| Announcements |
_____________________________________________
| canceled plant (2) | ewe, ram, elf |
| * animal slaughtered (| |
| given birth (10) | |
| more |===================|
| messages | |
| here | |
| ... | |
---------------------------------------------
geez, drawing ascii here is pain in the whatever. i hope you get the idea?!
i guess most useful to indicate which messages are newest might be to order them by date, descending, with the message on top with the dwarf/other reason which complained last.
to change the selection of the message i would suggest up/down keys, as it is now, for selection the message causer/to see the details +/- keys.
then, rss is old enough that it might fit to dwarf fortress
so an rss like feed of the announcements could be placed, maybe on the left side, of the main game screen. maybe like the menu/map tab, so i know which announcements there are without always pausing the game just to see if i missed something.
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|A| GAME | M | M |
| | GAME | E | A |
| | GAME | N | P |
| | GAME | U | |
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well, on subnotebooks, as i started playing DF on there wouldn't be much space of the screen for the game left, so maybe it could be deactivated by default. now i play on a much bigger screen, so i would appreciate such a tab.
Author
Topic: stopping announcement spam and static tab in game screen (Read 1210 times)