Change Alpha Channel property name on Simple Text Filter

Suggestion
1

Hi Guys,

Can we please demystify the Alpha Channel parameter of the Simple Text Filter by giving it a more intuitive name, e.g. Background Opacity?

As it is, non-Geeks don’t need to know what this parameter does MOST of the time. Currently, Shotcut cleverly changes Alpha Channel from 0 (default - transparent background) to 255 (completely opaque background) whenever a user chooses a background color other than black (Simple Text defaults to background Black and Transparent - Alpha Channel 0). This is a good behavior on the very reasonable assumption that if a user picks a color, he probably wants to see the color.

But what if you actually need a visible black background? Not all that uncommon, surely. Clicking on Black doesn’t do anything because the background color is already set to Black as the default. So clicking there again does NOT trigger the magic change in the Alpha Channel. THIS CAN BE VERY FRUSTRATING. Eventually I stumbled on the workflow of choosing another color, any color, then choosing Black whenever I needed a Black background… It was some time before I noticed the mysterious Alpha Channel parameter mysteriously changing.

A simple change of the name/label for Alpha Channel could fix all this quite cheaply. No doubt the name Alpha Channel has some reasonable historical or technical rationale. But for the uninitiated, I’m sorry, that name seems unutterably obscure.

Thanks
Steve

2

This is impossible because we do not make the color dialog. It is provided by the operating system or the GUI library we use. I am not going to make a custom color dialog just so I can change the name. This problem of choosing black was discussed recently in the beta thread. It will be addressed in the version after 20.10, probably 20.12

3

too bad, but I certainly can’t blame you for not wanting to reinvent a big wheel.

Steve