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Brandon Thomas
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# Conflicts: # crates/engine/src/tests_menu_cmds.rs # docs/effects-parity.md # docs/gaps.md # docs/ui-parity.md
50 lines
6.5 KiB
Markdown
50 lines
6.5 KiB
Markdown
# UI parity
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> **Last reviewed:** 2026-10-12 · **Last updated:** 2026-10-12 · **Change:** minor (closed issue references re-audited against `upstream/main` 470ea7a3) · **Target:** Adobe After Effects 2026
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How closely EffectCraft's interaction matches After Effects: tools, handles, snapping, nudging,
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modifier keys, shortcuts, drag behaviour, numeric entry, panels, context menus and feel. Evidence
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is the code at `origin/main` 1446e27, the 42 scripted UI test files in `crates/ui-egui/tests`
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(real pointer and keyboard events, run headless), [fidelity/workflow-checks.md](fidelity/workflow-checks.md)
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and the issue tracker. After Effects was not driven for this pass, so "same as After Effects" means
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"matches its documentation and users have not reported a difference".
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**Overall ≈ 65%** (estimated): the shape of the interface is After Effects' (menus, panels,
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workspaces, shortcuts), and the scripted tests cover many interactions, but users keep finding
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feel and platform differences, and the 26.x interface changes are not in yet.
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| Area | Status | % | Evidence and gaps |
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|---|---|---:|---|
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| Menu bar | After Effects' menus, order, submenus and labels; native on macOS; keyboard-operable in-window bar | 95% | 587 entries in `crates/engine/src/menus.rs`; Adobe-service entries omitted by design; `ui_menus` tests (#279) |
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| Panels and workspaces | Every After Effects panel; all standard workspaces; drag-to-dock, tabs, floating panels, maximise | 75% | `ui_tabs`, `ui_panels`; panels move into their own native windows on any screen (#486 open: no dragging tabs between those windows); #302, #301 and #320 (docking, stacked-panel headers, workspace persistence) are closed |
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| Timeline | Switches, modes, parent & link, twirl-downs, reveal shortcuts (U, UU, P, S, R, T, A, E, M, F, Alt+Shift…), pick whips, graph editor, work area, markers | 75% | `ui_keyframes`, `ui_timeline_*`; expand precomps in place (#601); #456, #457, #569 and #355 (Graph Editor jitter and buttons, negative rotation, bulk keyframing) are closed; Proportional Scrubbing (26.2: Ctrl+Alt / Cmd+Opt scrub of hot text spreads the change over the selected layers by selection order, #770) matched for layers selected as a whole, not yet for individually selected properties |
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| Composition viewer | Selection, handles with direction-aware cursors, rulers, guides, grids, snapping, channels, exposure, region of interest, snapshots, 3D views, Spacebar hand | 70% | `ui_viewer`, `ui_viewers`; Cmd/Ctrl +/− doesn't zoom (#570); anchor point grab on Linux (#492); #352 (snapping) is closed; no 3D transform gizmos (#392, #347); percentage guides (26.5) exist as View ▸ Add Percentage Guide and Convert Guides to Percentage / Pixels (a guide stores a percent of the comp, so it follows comp-size changes; behaviour inferred from the release note, not compared with After Effects); Copy Frame to Clipboard (26.3) is in the Composition menu and the viewer's context menu |
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| Tools panel | All After Effects tools; long-press flyouts; Tool Creates Shape / Mask; Fill / Stroke options | 80% | #213, #227 fixed; #553 (pen and vertex tools on motion paths) is closed |
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| Nudging and modifiers | Arrow nudge (1 px, Shift 10 px), Alt/Option duplicates and slips, Shift constrains | 75% | #290 nudging fixed; #491 (Linux multi-layer edits) is closed |
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| Numeric entry | Scrubbable values, typed entry with Tab / Shift+Tab, angle revolutions, Escape cancels, non-finite rejected | 85% | `ui_angles`, `ui_inline_edit` (#93, #141, #361); rename arrows on Linux (#488) |
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| Effect Controls | After Effects' twirl-downs, angle dial, point crosshair, eyedropper, curves/levels editors, effect menu on right-click | 70% | `ui_effect_controls`, `ui_fx_editors`; 26.5 rebuilt this panel with icon controls and effect colour labels: labels exist (a colour bar on the effect header, right-click Label menu, `effect.setLabel`; not in the Timeline), the rebuilt controls are not matched |
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| Context menus | Layer, property, Project, Timeline empty area, work area, labels with colours | 80% | `ui_blank_context_menus`, `ui_project_rows`; #227, #290, #407 fixed; a comp's Project row menu has Composition Settings… (#1058) |
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| Keyboard shortcuts | After Effects' defaults; Keyboard Shortcuts editor that rebinds and saves sets | 75% | Shortcut editor in Settings; #467 (adding shortcuts on Linux), #428 and #336 are closed; no shortcuts for scripts |
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| Drag and drop | Project → Timeline / viewer / New Comp / Render Queue; effects onto layers; files from the OS | 65% | `ui_drag_drop`; OS drops fail on Wayland (winit) and some Linux setups (#268); #552, #351 (multi-file drops) and #511 (crash dragging over the import dialog) are closed |
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| Text editing on canvas | Point and paragraph text, per-character styles, Character / Paragraph panels, OpenType and variable axes | 70% | `ui_text_edit`, `ui_font_search`; paragraph alignment inverted (#316); toolbar font options (#550); font search by typing (#583) is closed; the font menus' variable-font filter (26.3) landed (#741) |
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| Preview feel | Spacebar / Numpad 0 previews, RAM preview, cache bars, adaptive resolution | 55% | `ui_ram_preview`, `ui_live_preview`; stutter (#595, #304); scrubbing lag (#329, closed by #784) |
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| Home screen, Learn, templates | Home with recent projects, template gallery, interactive Learn tutorials | 70% | Layout nitpicks (#581); Home literals untranslated (#574) |
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| Quick Apply (26.2) | Search to apply effects, presets or commands | partial | A command palette exists; not After Effects' Quick Apply |
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| Accessibility | AccessKit enabled; focus labels tested; Project panel keyboard navigation and accessible names (#776) | 20% | No screen-reader pass or keyboard-navigation audit of the other panels; no contrast check |
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| UI scale | Settings ▸ Appearance ▸ UI Scale 75–200% | beyond | After Effects follows the system's scaling (#284) |
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## Estimate
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**≈ 60–120 h**: the open interaction issues above (25–45 h, about 0.2–0.5 h each with a scripted
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test), 3D gizmos 8–15 h, multi-monitor panels 10–20 h, the 26.x interface changes 10–20 h, an
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accessibility pass 15–30 h. Checking feel against After Effects needs the owner's Mac with After
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Effects running; most of the rest parallelises.
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## Revision history
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| Date | Change | Summary |
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|---|---|---|
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| 2026-10-12 | minor | Closed issues (#302, #320, #491, #511, #553 and others) marked as closed instead of open; panels in their own windows (#486) |
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| 2026-10-12 | minor | Percentage guides and effect colour labels (26.5) added; rows updated |
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| 2026-10-10 | major | First UI parity checklist |
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