Also, if you go to 'Tools' 'Extensions' there's plenty you can add to the
basic Firefox.

I've got Chatzilla (for irc) and Sage (for rss (don't ask - I'm not entirely
clear what rss is, myself)).

--
Ian Tindale

On 25 Jan 2005 wrote:

Tom Anderson:
On 24 Jan 2005 wrote:

Tom Anderson:

I'm not sure about the one colour per terminal, though. LU's maps
have the idea of one colour per line, which i think should be
maintained,

I don't think every different route needs different colours

Well, it doesn't *need* it, strictly, but i think it'd be more useful.
I'm not saying every combination of source and destination should have
a unique colour, just that colours should be used to break the routes
up into more than the three or four groups colouring by terminal would
give.

It'd be more than three or four, surely. I count:

-Fenchurch Street
-Liverpool Street (split into via Hackney, via Stratford)
-Kings Cross/Moorgate
-Thameslink
-Euston
-Marylebone
-Paddington
-Heathrow Express
-Waterloo (split into via Putney, via Wimbledon)
-Victoria (split into via Balham, via Brixton perhaps)
-Blackfriars
-Charing Cross/Cannon Street-London Bridge (South Eastern lines -
perhaps split into North Kent and Mid-Kent lines)
-London Bridge (Southern Lines)
-Orbital routes

That's a lot of colours.

A good point, well made; i'd been ignoring the lines north of the river.
However, i'd say there were 12 termini, to your 14:

Fenchurch Street
Liverpool Street (Hackney, Stratford)
King's Cross St Pancras / Moorgate
Thameslink
Euston
Marylebone
Paddington
Waterloo (Richmond, Wimbledon)
Victoria (Clapham Junction, Clapham High Street)
Blackfriars
London Bridge, including CX/CS (Southern, North Kent, Mid-Kent)
Orbital

There are 12 LU lines, so we could cover each terminus without too much
trouble, but LU already use shades, so it would be tricky to make my
scheme work. You might manage it with some low cunning - count Fenchurch
Street as Liverpool Street, count King's Cross, Blackfriars and Thameslink
as a single unit, etc.

Liverpool Street - red
Hackney - deep red
Stratford - bright red
Fenchurch Street - pink
Thameslink Axis - purple
Thameslink - royal purple
King's Cross + Moorgate - deep purple (Metropolitan)
Blackfriars - lilac (ugh)
Euston - yellow
Lines Vaguely Towards The West - brown
Paddington - brown
Marylebone - tan
Waterloo - green
Richmond - light green
Wimbledon - dark green
Victoria - blue
Clapham Junction - light blue
Clapham High Street - dark blue
London Bridge - (black)
Southern - black
North Kent - dark grey
Mid-Kent - light grey
Orbital - orange

How does that look? Ideally, i'd use black for orbital routes (no terminal
= no colour), but the multiple shades are just too useful.

Alternatively, perhaps the different lines could be differentiated by
shape? They could be decorated with lumps or nicks (like the tram on the
TfL London Connections map).

Also, things'll be easier once we have Crossrail - GE and GW could be the
same colour! I'm not sure what effect TL2k will have ...

(and there are limits on the number of them you can have,
particularly given the tube will be included as well).

Hmm. I think there are few enough colours left after the tube lines
that we're going to have duplication anyway.

You may be right. Thicker or thinner lines, then...?

For railways? As now, i'd say - hollow lines.

tom

--
I see large and small words on this page, arranged in long rows separated by little dotty characters. Suspect written by little dotty characters, too. -- RonJeffries

On Tue, 25 Jan 2005, Dave Arquati wrote:

Mrs Redboots wrote:
TheOneKEA wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 25 Jan 2005:

JFYI, I maintain that extension. If you want additional tab features,
you should add the miniT, Click2Tab, FLST and Undo Close Tab
extensions.

Oh, i hadn't seen Undo Close Tab before - useful!

Thank you. I find I am liking Firefox more and more, the more I use it.
Daughter and her fiancé made me download it at first, but I don't think
even they realise some of its features! I've spent several hours this
afternoon playing with it, and really making friends with it. Now all I
have to do is learn to write source code....

That's the spirit!

I've been using it for ages and only this week discovered an extremely
useful feature - type "goto search term" in the address bar and it'll do
a Google I'm Feeling Lucky search on the search term. If you can guess
easily how to bring up a site as the first result, then this is
extremely quick. For example: "goto tfl 2016 map".

As has been pointed out, you don't need the goto. Also, if you'd rather
have the full search results than the I'm Feeling Lucky redirect, you can
change it: enter "about:config" in the location bar, pause briefly to
marvel at the vista of tweaking opportunities that has just opened to you,
find the entry for browser.search.defaulturl (for example, by entering it
into the filter box) and change it to:

http://www.google.co.uk/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&q=

Or some other search URL.

You can also add your own keywords to any bookmark, which is again very
useful, so you can quickly access links even if they're not on your
quick links bar. For example, I have the keyword "tfljp" which takes me
directly to TfL's full Journey Planner, rather than the front page of
journeyplanner.org.

Ah, but have you felt the awesome power of fully operational search
shortcuts? Make a bookmark with a %s (percent sign, letter s) in the URL
and give it a keyword. Now enter "keyword something" in the location bar;
you'll go the URL you entered, but with the %s replaced with the text
after the keyword. For example, i've got:

http://www.livedepartureboards.co.uk...mary.aspx?T=%s

With the keyword 'ldb'; thus, i can type 'ldb FPK' to see the trains at
Finsbury Park. That might actually be a bad example, since a google search
for 'ldb FPK' seems to do just as well!

What's more, you can combine search shortcuts with bookmarklets to
essentially turn your location bar into a command line interface - and
that's what i call REAL ultimate power .

tom

--
eviscerated by obfuscation

On Tue, 25 Jan 2005, Dave Arquati wrote:

John Rowland wrote:
"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...

In Internet Explorer it's not a terrible idea as opening a link a new
window is an alien concept to many users and involves right-clicking
and choosing the option.

No, you hold the shift key down as you left-click on the link.

Oh well - middle-clicking is easier

Not on a Mac!

tom

--
eviscerated by obfuscation

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 25 Jan 2005, Dave Arquati wrote:

John Rowland wrote:

"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...

In Internet Explorer it's not a terrible idea as opening a link a new
window is an alien concept to many users and involves right-clicking
and choosing the option.

No, you hold the shift key down as you left-click on the link.

Oh well - middle-clicking is easier

Not on a Mac!

That's what people get when they choose design over... erm... multiple
mouse buttons. I depend heavily on all three of mine...

--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 25 Jan 2005, Dave Arquati wrote:

Mrs Redboots wrote:

TheOneKEA wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 25 Jan 2005:

JFYI, I maintain that extension. If you want additional tab features,
you should add the miniT, Click2Tab, FLST and Undo Close Tab
extensions.

Oh, i hadn't seen Undo Close Tab before - useful!

I have an itchy trigger finger and click everything with every button,
so I've found it extremely useful.

[Firefox]
[snip very useful info]
You can also add your own keywords to any bookmark, which is again very
useful, so you can quickly access links even if they're not on your
quick links bar. For example, I have the keyword "tfljp" which takes me
directly to TfL's full Journey Planner, rather than the front page of
journeyplanner.org.

Ah, but have you felt the awesome power of fully operational search
shortcuts? Make a bookmark with a %s (percent sign, letter s) in the URL
and give it a keyword. Now enter "keyword something" in the location bar;
you'll go the URL you entered, but with the %s replaced with the text
after the keyword. For example, i've got:

http://www.livedepartureboards.co.uk...mary.aspx?T=%s

With the keyword 'ldb'; thus, i can type 'ldb FPK' to see the trains at
Finsbury Park. That might actually be a bad example, since a google search
for 'ldb FPK' seems to do just as well!

I did know about these but I forgot about Live Departure Boards.
Excellent idea. I'm using "trains" as my keyword... people will think I
have some magical computer which works out what I want when I type it in!

Another useful one is:
http://www.multimap.com/map/places.cgi?quicksearch=%s

With keyword "map", the country is at your disposal with postcodes or
places (street names work sometimes but are a bit flaky).

What's more, you can combine search shortcuts with bookmarklets to
essentially turn your location bar into a command line interface - and
that's what i call REAL ultimate power .

That's quite scary, and I hadn't even thought of it.

--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

Ian Tindale wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 25 Jan 2005:

Also, if you go to 'Tools' 'Extensions' there's plenty you can add to the
basic Firefox.

I've got Chatzilla (for irc) and Sage (for rss (don't ask - I'm not entirely
clear what rss is, myself)).

Nor am I, but I think it's to do with live websites - you can, for
instance put a "live bookmark" for BBC News on it, and the headlines in
the bookmark update themselves automagically throughout the day, which I
find quite remarkable.
--
"Mrs Redboots"
http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/
Website updated 23 January 2005 with new photos

Tom Anderson wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 25 Jan 2005:

What's more, you can combine search shortcuts with bookmarklets to
essentially turn your location bar into a command line interface - and
that's what i call REAL ultimate power .

I know this is *quite* the wrong forum to ask in, but what *are*
"bookmarklets"?
--
"Mrs Redboots"
http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/
Website updated 23 January 2005 with new photos

Tom Anderson wrote to uk.transport.london on Tue, 25 Jan 2005:

With the keyword 'ldb'; thus, i can type 'ldb FPK' to see the trains at
Finsbury Park. That might actually be a bad example, since a google search
for 'ldb FPK' seems to do just as well!

But "ldb RDH" doesn't work at all, so it's as well to do it the long
way.

What's more, you can combine search shortcuts with bookmarklets to
essentially turn your location bar into a command line interface - and
that's what i call REAL ultimate power .

I've now found out what they are and downloaded some for conversions -
so necessary as I spend a lot of time on-line with American friends!
--
"Mrs Redboots"
http://www.amsmyth.demon.co.uk/
Website updated 23 January 2005 with new photos

On Wed, 26 Jan 2005 11:21:30 +0000, Dave Arquati
wrote:

That's what people get when they choose design over... erm... multiple
mouse buttons. I depend heavily on all three of mine...

Indeed. The single mouse button on a Mac doesn't lead to a more
efficient UI design - it instead leads to what I've heard described as
"Shift-Ctrl-leg-in-the-air-Click", IYSWIM.

And I *like* my context menus, as a former Acorn RISC-OS user
(superbly intuitive UI, and 3 mouse buttons!).

Neil

--
Neil Williams in Milton Keynes, UK
When replying please use neil at the above domain
'wensleydale' is a spam trap and is not read.