Feature Improvements & Issues … let’s talk about Quelea.
Intro:
I have been a long-time user of Quelea and as such, I can say that I really like it and at the same time dislike it.
Therefore, in this series of posts, I want to talk about Quela in the broader spectrum. That is to say, compare and contrast to OpenLP, ProPresenter and some others in the context of what I like and dislike, and naturally how we can make it better.
Aim of the post:
My aim is to point out some issues and open a discussion about some features.
I hope the takeaway from this will be that we will get a better Quelea that irons out some of the issues and makes the program more complete.
My part in all that
Oh, not to forget to mention, I will be taking on one of those issues myself and do my part. I should be able to share it with everybody before Christmas.
Because the posts are rather long and the issues are distinct I will put them in separate posts but it’s all part of one “grand” idea.
My grand concern:
First of all, Quelea and the rest of its kind are all fairly mature software packages. At this point, I feel like Quelea is getting stagnant. Sure bugs are fixed and some new small features are added but I feel like there is nothing particularly exciting lately. Let’s call that the competitive edge!
Well in all fairness, the story is somewhat similar for OpenLP but I feel a bit less so.
While this is my subjective opinion here are the 2 top reasons I think that’s the case: 1. Larger user base and 2. plugins.
Why Quelea?:
Initially (years ago) my idea was to use OpenLP but multilingual presentations didn’t work. In a church where you regularly have to have the option to switch on English/(other languages) subtitles on-off on the fly was done “more right” in Quelea than OpenLP. Let’s face it, both are more similar than dissimilar therefore the subtitle features done “more right” determine the use of the tool.
This concept of “more right” is what made me what to share my thoughts with you so that hopefully we can converge to more right!
Issue 1: View modes for different workflows
As a live musician, with limited screen real estate, I often need to switch between different view modes.
Take the X-Air-Edit for example. You have the big mixer, but then you can have a small separate window or user modes with selected channels just for what you actually need live. Think OBS! Same with Quelea or any other software where you have a preparation part and a performance live part. There are two distinct working flows with two distinct needs for interfaces and quelea is annoyingly stiff compared to OpenLP which has done this “more right”!
Solution:
What is needed is switchable windows and panels and the ability to separate windows. For example, flowing or dockable like Reaper.
While I have tested a small patch mentioned down below I think the flow for every need is similar to OBS. Studio/Live mode + being able to turn panels on or off.
My small contribution:
Well a while ago I actually submitted a simple switch mechanism that allows you to bypass the preview panel and everything goes straight to the Live panel.