New user interface

The user interface in Adobe Encore DVD 2.0 provides a new system of panels that dock and group to make organizing your work and tools easier than ever. This new environment is more efficient and less cluttered, eliminating the headache of overlapping or hidden windows and palettes. Rearranging your workspace is a snap, so you can spend more time producing your DVD and less time adjusting your desktop layout. These panels are also found in the new versions of After Effects, Adobe Premiere Pro, and Adobe Audition—a consistency that makes your work even more intuitive if you use two or more of these applications together.

Adobe Encore DVD 2.0 also introduces a new approach to named workspaces, allowing you to automatically save any modifications you make to panel arrangement, without going through an additional Save operation.

Try it: Organizing your workspace with panels that dock and group

1. Click New Project in the Welcome to Adobe Encore DVD dialog box.

2. Select the NTSC standard in the New Project Settings dialog box, and then click OK.

3. Enter a name for your project, and then click Save.

4. Choose File > New > Timeline.

5. Note that unlike previous releases of Encore, by default there are no palettes floating separately from the application window (though you will learn later in this document how you can float panels if you want). Instead, the entire application window is occupied by frames holding the various user interface panels that are open. In this opening default arrangement, each of the frames holds a tabbed group of panels.

6. Resize the Encore application window by dragging on any corner. If the window is in Maximize mode, first click Restore at top right to make the window resizable. Notice that as you resize the application window, some of the frames holding panels within the window proportionately resize within it, while others remain the same size. Each panel in the application is assigned resizing rules to help minimize adjustments you need to make in panel sizes after changing the size of the overall application window. For grouped panels, the topmost panel in a frame controls the resizing for that frame. This means you no longer need to move and resize multiple windows and palettes, or minimize and hide Encore DVD when you need more screen real estate. Instead you can simply resize the main window, and then make only minimal adjustments—if any—to individual frames.

7. Position your cursor at the edge between any two frames, and see that the cursor icon changes into a vertical or horizontal drag icon. Now drag the cursor and resize the two frames. With this one-step adjustment, you can resize panels without overlapping, and full utilization of the application window is maintained. If you position the panels so that four corners meet, and then place your cursor at the corner where they meet, you will find that you can resize all four with one action.8. Click on the various tabs in any panel group. See that panel size remains consistent within the frame, with no overlapping of adjacent panel groups.

9. Drag any panel by the textured dots area of its name tab and maneuver
groups. As you move within those groups' frames, note that various regions
highlight. The highlighted region at any moment shows where the panel positioned
relative to the frame underneath. Different regions indicate the
or right, or above or below the underlying frame. A highlight in the center
the panel you are dragging will be added to that frame. Drag various
get a feel for how easy it is to rearrange your workspace.

10. You can also move entire groups of panels at the same time. Simply drag
tab at the upper right-hand corner of a group.

11. If you prefer, you can place any of the workspace panels in frames that
main application window. This option can be especially useful when
you want to maximize the application window on one monitor while visible
on the second monitor. To create a floating panel or group of panels,
the individual or group tab. Or alternatively, you can create floating panels
outside of the Encore application window. Floating panels and panel
drag bar at top. Use that drag bar to reposition the floating panel(s). Resize
can drag by either the individual or group tabs to move panels back into
You can also drag panels between any two floating panel groups.

Try it: Saving workspaces for each phase of your project
Producing DVDs requires different tasks at different stages of the process, and the best workspace arrangement
for one task may not be ideal for another. Through its enhanced workspace features, Adobe Encore DVD 2.0 provides a time-saving solution for this dilemma.

Throughout the steps in the previous exercise, you were modifying the workspace named Default. All the changes you made to the Default workspace—moving, resizing, and regrouping panels—automatically became part of the Default workspace definition as you made them, with no need to go through an additional
Save process. Don't worry if your experimenting left things in a less than ideal arrangement. Reversing
those changes and returning to the original Default layout definition is easy, as you'll see in step 3 below.

1. Choose Window > Workspace. The submenu that opens offers predefined workspaces for some of the most common tasks in DVD production, such as Menu Design and Timeline Editing. Use the menu to switch among these workspaces and observe how the layout changes from workspace to workspace. Note that groups, group arrangements, positions, and sizes, even the overall application window size, can change from one workspace to the next. Again, any changes you make while in one workspace is automatically kept with that workspace definition, and will appear again the next time you choose that workspace. (You can choose the current workspace in either this submenu, or by using the pull-down menu at the upper right corner of the application window, but other workspace controls outlined in this section are available through this Window > Workspace submenu only.)

2. If you want to create a defined workspace for another task, arrange the panels to suit your preferences, and then choose Window > Workspace > New Workspace. Assign the workspace a name, and then click OK. The new workspace now appears as a menu choice along with the other workspaces.

3. You can easily revert any workspace to its original definition. Let's do that now for the Default workspace you modified earlier in this guide. Choose Window > Workspace > Default. Now revert it to its original layout by choosing Window > Workspace > Reset Workspace. Click Yes in the Reset Workspace confirmation
dialog box. The Default workspace should now appear as it did when you began.

The steps above showed you how easy it is to organize the controls and content workspace panels in Adobe Encore DVD 2.0, including resizing, moving, regrouping, and floating the panels, and how to save different arrangements as named workspaces for use in different tasks. This efficient work environment allows you to concentrate on creating your DVD, not managing your software. Also, remember that this same user interface
is also found in After Effects 7.0, Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0, and Adobe Audition 2.0, making workflow even more intuitive for those working with more than one of these post-production applications.

When you have finished, choose File > Close Project. Click No when prompted to save changes.