I’m currently working on a file converter app that lets you easily convert your files in bulk without needing to mess around with 500 settings or confusing command-line apps. It’s mostly a replacement for all those “convert X to Y” websites.

This is just a front-end for ffmpeg and imagemagick, but the goal is to make something so simple even my parents could use without uploading sensitive files to shady websites on the internet. I’ve looked around, and I found all the local GUI converters like Handbrake are unwieldy to use, especially if you just want to convert in bulk.

The project is still very early, but I’d like some feedback:

  1. Does anyone think this project is worth finishing, or are there too many GUI file converters out there already?

  2. What do you think about the UI so far?

Cheers.

  • 9bananas@feddit.org
    5·
    9 hours ago

    oh, i am VERY interested in this!

    seems like it’d be a very handy tool for modding, since file conversions are usually either done through gimp, if it supports the format, or some random ass tool/website that does only one thing…

    having a swiss army knife type solution would be excellent!

    one point of feedback about the interface:

    anytime there’s a slider, there should also be a direct input field to type into.

    this is to prevent things like UI scaling, or mouse sensitivity preventing proper input…ask me how i know…

    might also be an accessibility thing; for example people with tremors, or generally low dexterity.

    text input is never the wrong choice, but sliders can be!

  • Zombie@feddit.uk
    5·
    18 hours ago

    I like the look of this!

    My only suggestion would be to change the word delete to remove. Unless of course its function is in fact to delete the file from the HDD, but I assume it means to remove the file from the conversion process.

  • TriangleSpecialist@lemmy.world
    27·
    1 day ago

    Hey, I’m clearly not in the target audience, so take what I’m about to say with a grain of salt.

    I think your motivation is great, I absolutely loathe these websites you mention and, if my mother was prone to doing these operations on her machine, I’d worry quite a bit.

    By virtue of that alone, I believe this is a worthwhile endeavour and you should keep at it.

    But to answer more specifically your points.

    1. I don’t know about the state of other GUI tools. Maybe the problem has more to do with exposure than lack of choice? I don’t think more choice is necessarily bad, the real issue is managing to put it in front of the people you’re targeting.
    2. That goes to my second point. I could subjectively give you my opinion on it, but it would be better to have it tested by someone who fits the bill of intended user. I don’t know how many of these people you’ll find on Lemmy tbh.

    Personally I… am not a fan of the interface but, I am a grumpy middle aged person who started on computers way too young on an Atari running Atari TOS… So my idea of a good GUI would probably send horror shivers down a lot of people’s spines. There are objectively good points to yours: it looks snappy, reactive, there are not a lot of buttons or options so as not to overwhelm, and an easy and clear way to open the file explorer. Looks like a great proof of concept that you can keep polishing and iterating on as you go.

    Good luck with it!

      • Batmorous@piefed.socialEnglish
        13·
        19 hours ago

        Would be cool to have a toggleable option between using Modern GUI and Classic GUI to add on top of what TriangleSpecialist said about not liking Modern GUIs

      • TriangleSpecialist@lemmy.world
        8·
        1 day ago

        If I feel like trolling a bit, I’d say this:

        But in all seriousness, I just don’t like the modern minimalistic styles and sliding animations and whatnot. I would not push something like the image above onto a user, but I’d be perfectly happy using that, personally.

        For an actual answer, I’ve been getting into trackers lately on what little free time I have and am really enjoying milkytracker’s interface:

        • Flagstaff@programming.devEnglish
          3·
          23 hours ago

          Dang… Thanks for the reminder about Milkytracker. I gotta dig into that… Also, I’m fine with that top GUI as well, haha! Unclear boundaries are visually tricky to me, too.

          • TriangleSpecialist@lemmy.world
            4·
            23 hours ago

            Yup there is a bit of that, and also for me, although I readily admit the above is a bit cluttered, there is something nice about having the information laid out in a plane rather than nested in a hierarchy of menus.

            Obviously, that’s not always possible, but I find sometimes that, for the sake of each pane appearing “simple” and “clean”, I need to hold more context in my head of where things are, and how deeply nested they are.

  • TheLeadenSea@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    19·
    1 day ago

    I like the idea a lot, I don’t know how to use CLI well and I dislike those websites. I would suggest for the UI to use standard graphics libraries like GTK, or Windows and Mac default theming to make it consistent with other OS apps and themeable by the user, if you can do that

  • Jesus_666@lemmy.worldEnglish
    11·
    1 day ago

    Looks simple enough. The choice of Godot for a UI library is an interesting one; how big is the program in the end?

    I would suggest being a bit more explicit about files: Which ones are in the working set; which one is currently being worked on, that sort of thing. Having a file list (even if it’s hidden in a drawer or something) before starting the conversion helps the user verify that the correct files are being worked on. Seeing which file is currently being processed might be useful for troubleshooting or just to see how far along the process is.

    • popcar2@programming.devOPEnglish
      11·
      1 day ago

      The choice of Godot for a UI library is an interesting one; how big is the program in the end?

      Not small but not huge either, the app itself will be within 25MB uncompressed (<10MB zipped) - but it doesn’t matter that much since most of the file size will be the dependencies used to convert stuff. I have a blog post talking more about Godot for GUI apps if you’re interested.

      The rest of the feedback is appreciated! I was just about to add some text showing which file was being converted when processing.

  • muzzle@lemmy.zip
    8·
    1 day ago

    if you are looking to expand this, I think a fronted to pandoc to convert between text document types is also very needed.

  • arsCynic@piefed.socialEnglish
    121·
    1 day ago

    I love you. That’s my opinion.

    As for actual feedback, when saving/converting images I always require a preview or I’m just not going to use it; I find great satisfaction in carefully trial-and-erroring my way into the nicest image quality with the lowest file size.

  • Jumuta@sh.itjust.works
    2·
    18 hours ago

    I’d love this, I think the biggest obstacle is beating the online converter sites on friction of use, but the automatic file type detection feels like a really good way to combat that

  • ulterno@programming.devEnglish
    2·
    19 hours ago
    1. I think it would be better called a media file converter or something more specific like that, unless you actually intend on adding more types of file, like doc, odf, md, pdf etc.
    2. Interesting. I also made a little thingy for personal use, though it does literally call the ffmpeg CLI tool. Haven’t even made an install configuration though, so you will just have to run it out of the build directory.
    • Oberyn@lemmy.world
      3·
      18 hours ago

      If intend to have broad filetype support , would love to see offline font conversion . Practicly no offine (working )?font format converter out there . Sucks !

  • borth@sh.itjust.works
    7·
    1 day ago

    I like it so far! Looks like it would be easier to use for a good amount of people, and better than going to those sites each time.

  • crippy@lemmy.world
    1·
    19 hours ago

    I don’t know if this can help for inspiration, but I use this tool for file conversion: Convertx It doesn’t have a bulk mode.

  • Batmorous@piefed.socialEnglish
    1·
    19 hours ago

    I would also say no your project is very welcome and love that you can do photos and videos at once!! Highly looking forward to it being released in future!!

    1. As another suggestion aside from my other comment it would be cool if we can set individually what each individual photo/video will convert too. Can be for future reworked version of this project. That would help a ton for batch work.

    2. Also, setup a Liberapay to get the most out of donations. Have the link in your app too somewhere so people can donate/see how much you make/how much more you need with a bar saying how much more is needed.

    3. A queue feature to queue multiple photos and videos to be converted then add more to the active queue whenever

    4. A customizeable template feature would be cool too for people who work with specific files a lot. For example setting it to auto convert PNG to JPG, or MP4 TO MP3, etc.