The user interface of Zoho Creator has always been a notch
below
(several notches, to be honest) the capabilities of the service itself. It is because we've been putting too much of our time and effort into improving the functionality of the product than on showcasing a half-baked one. What good might a flashy interface be without the potential of the service, we thought. We were right, except for the fact that it could also have been misinterpreted as low self-esteem on our part. So here is what's been keeping us busy recently. We
revamped the page layout to a more peppy tone so as to suit fresh minds.
Multitasking, made simple:
There used to be a roundabout way of opening views and forms simultaneously, for editing, in separate tabs or windows. It just got straightforward. Mouse-over the form/view in question, right-click on the name and choose to open it in a new tab or window. This comes in handy especially when you need to work on several dependent forms/views without having to navigate away from the current page every time.
View Type Icons:
We've come up with a dedicated icon for every type of view that you can create in Zoho Creator. When you hover your mouse over the view tab, in addition to displaying the list of views of your application, every view name is accompanied by the view type icon. So if you have more than one view with the same name but of different types, locating the specific view that you are looking for should not take you more than a jiffy.
Listing lots of forms and views:
We found that some of you who use Zoho Creator extensively, have a large number of forms and views. Listing them on mouse-over of the Forms/Views tab used to be a pain. If you had had a small screen, some Forms/Views would have been missing from the list displayed. According to the new design, 40 items will be listed by default in two columns, with a link "Show all", which on clicking, will display another 20 items on the third column. If you happen to have more than that, scroll away using the horizontal scroll bar that appears instantly.
One Click New Component:
Whatever you wish to create, be it a new form, view, report, schedule or function, is now just a click away. The action of creating new components is now grouped under a unified button titled "Create". This Create button will always be visible, irrespective of the current tab you are working on, thus enabling you to create whatever from anywhere. In other words, to create a function, it is now redundant to click on the Script tab first and then on Functions.
Why we single out the functions here is because it got us a lot more bouquets than we expected. That is when we realized how inevitable it has become.
Application Settings:
With an increase in the number of attributes that can be applied to an application, it was time to move on from the dull old "application settings dialog box". Application settings now has a dedicated page from which you can access a long list of settings for your application. Of course, a few settings have been newly introduced too. Federated log-in, for instance. You can display options for the user to log-in using Yahoo, Google or even Facebook credentials.
The extremely useful "Allow edit access to support" makes an appearance in this page, and a prominent one indeed. So the next time you need to let support access your application, you don't have to navigate to the share tab. There is one more place where you can find it.
Want more?
That being said, we know you are hard to please. That’s what keeps us going. But would a teaser, on what's yet to come, work on you? User home-page revamp is on the cards for an enhanced Zoho Creator experience. Expect it sometime soon.
Follow us:
@Mark: Group/reorder sounds promising. As for descriptions, we'll have to see how well it fits into the interface. Thank you for the suggestions.@Marcky: "Developing Days are narrowed down to hours, what a time saver!"Glad to know Zoho Creator is doing what it was meant to do. Glad again that the UI now works fine on iPhone's Safari; Double delight! We will keep you posted on iPad compatibility updates.
Thanks for your participation, and do spread the word.
@Mark: Group/reorder sounds promising. As for descriptions, we'll have to see how well it fits into the interface. Thank you for the suggestions.@Marcky: "Developing Days are narrowed down to hours, what a time saver!"Glad to know Zoho Creator is doing what it was meant to do. Glad again that the UI now works fine on iPhone's Safari; Double delight! We will keep you posted on iPad compatibility updates.
Thanks for your participation, and do spread the word.
Im still evaluating creator and I am liking what I see and what I can do. Developing Days are narrowed down to hours, what a time saver! Works specially for visual types of person who has less or even no coding skills. The new ui enables the apps to now show in safari for iPhone. Thinking it will work now for iPad as well. But can't drag the buttons so can't create forms in touch based devices. Hope this "fix" is included in the very near future updates.
Im still evaluating creator and I am liking what I see and what I can do. Developing Days are narrowed down to hours, what a time saver! Works specially for visual types of person who has less or even no coding skills. The new ui enables the apps to now show in safari for iPhone. Thinking it will work now for iPad as well. But can't drag the buttons so can't create forms in touch based devices. Hope this "fix" is included in the very near future updates.
Glad to see some changes coming to the home screen too. I would like to be able to group/reorder my apps and provide a short description for each one.
Glad to see some changes coming to the home screen too. I would like to be able to group/reorder my apps and provide a short description for each one.