Slicer3:Human Interface and Style Guide for Developers

Slicer Human Interface Design and Style Guidelines

Introduction

3D Slicer (or Slicer) is a large and continuously developing application. Its base is designed to offer substantial core functionality, and its modules extend that functionality to include specialized and cutting-edge research tools and interoperability with other open source softwares. The development effort seeks to simultaneously ensure that Slicer meets the needs of a broad user community, that developers can easily contribute to and extend the application, and that the software remains easy to test and maintain.

These human interface design and style guidelines are a resource for Slicer developers who want to create module interfaces that are easy to learn, understandable and usable, and that conform to Slicer’s general appearance and behavior conventions. The recommendations in this document are designed to be easy for developers to apply and their adoption is strongly encouraged. However, a developer’s interface design can depart from convention when these guidelines appear inappropriate for a particular application.

Organization

This document is organized into the following two sections:

1. Slicer Module Design Principles

2. Slicer Widget and Interface Style Specifics

Within these sections, developers will find recommendations that promote usable and consistent Slicer module interfaces, and link to technical resources where appropriate.