Addon Spotlight: Minimalist
Aug 24th, 2008
Welcome to this week's Addon Spotlight, where I'm going to pay tribute to your feedback by giving an official thank-you to you all for turning me on to Minimalist. Basically, this addon does everything I've been using multiple addons to accomplish in one simple package, with a memory footprint even Tekkub would be proud of. (I think, he gets pretty fired up about wasted resources.)Alright, back to Minimalist, the addon that makes a bunch of little adjustments, helping to clean up the some-times cluttered default UI. It provides a way to automate some simple commands and remove some unwanted knick-knacks. (Actionbar chickens, begone!) The good news is that this is an Ace addon and there is already a Wrath-compliant version for those of you in the Beta.To access the menu, you'll need to use the following slash command:
- /min
"Minimalist is an attempt to replace CT_Mastermod that has grown to be more than CT_Mastermod. Basically it is a collection of miscellaneous UI tweaks and automations for building a minimal UI with minimal addons or using as the core of a compilation. Options include (but are not limited to):
AutoMagic:
- Auto-Ignore Duels - As it says, auto ignores duel requests.
- Auto-Repair - Similar to DurabilityFU
- Auto-Resurrect - Automatically accepts Resurrections.
- Auto-Sell Grey Items - Similar to Auto-Profit, though you cannot add new items, that I am aware of.
- Auto-Skip Useless Gossips - Skips 'extra' vendor chatter and goes right to the sell screen.
- Smart Taxi - Bypasses taxi chat box, auto dismounts and un-shifts druids.
- Better Reputation - Displays reputation numbers on the reputation window, and displays progress, when you are awarded reputation, in the chat box.
- Disable Gryphons - Removes the Gryphon graphic from Default action bars.
- Display Quest Levels - Displays quest levels.
- Fixed Inspect - Removes the distance checking on inspect.
- Honor Progress Percent - Shows % on honor progression.
- Fix Arrow Keys - Lets your use [Left] and [Right] to move through the text you are typing needing to hold down the [Alt] key.
- Hide Buttons - Hides the buttons on the chat windows
- Move Input Box - Moves the chat input box to the top of the chat frame
- Mouse Scrolling - Enables using the mouse wheel to scroll chat frames.
- Reduce Chat Clutter - Shortens chat channel names, IE. [Guild] becomes (G), [Party] becomes (P), etc.
- Time Stamps - Adds a time stamp to messages.
- Hide Clutter - Turns off the zoom in/out buttons, titles box and the sun dial.
- Location X, Y - Adds your X, Y coordinates to the lower portion of the minimap.
- MouseWheel Zoom - Allows you to use the mouse wheel to zoom the minimap."
I would check this out if you're looking for an addon to make some minor adjustmetns for a minimal cost in memory. You'll forgive me for the lackluster feature this week, I've just returned from an unannounced hiatus to the Grand Tetons and I'm working on a lengthy feature on Dual-boxing on a Mac. So, check in next week for some Recruit-A-Multiboxer love. Dismissed!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
8-24-2008 @ 5:19PM
Tekkub said...
"with a memory footprint even Tekkub would be proud of. (I think, he gets pretty fired up about wasted resources.)"
Ironically, I always thought Minimalist was overboard. Yes, it's low memory use... but it's what I tend to call a "borg mod"... it absorbs every neat idea it comes across.
I'd much rather install a dozen single-purpose addons than one "does it all" addon, regardless of that addon's memory use. Of course, I have written a dozen little addons to do the things I want from Minimalist...
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 5:58PM
KeaheTriste said...
While I see what you are saying, it's also exactly what Blizzard did with WoW. They looked at everything that worked in the MMO world, cut out the fat and sold the "Borg Game" to us.
I myself like the idea of combining everything into one. Sure it doesn't do anything other separate programs don't, but it takes the idea of them and refines it.
8-24-2008 @ 6:24PM
Aigarius said...
Considering that each addon is a separate subfolder and several files, that each of them needs some boilerplate code to init and configure and considering that each of them needs to be updated ... some functions are better to be united.
8-24-2008 @ 7:21PM
Tekkub said...
@KeaheTriste well, yes and no. Blizzard does bring in good ideas, but they aren't very "borgy" in that they don't just up and bring in every good idea they find, and they are very careful about what they bring in and how. Besides that, the default UI *must* be an all-in-one package by it's very nature.
@Aigarius, I'm not saying Minimalist is a badly written addon at all. I'm simply saying that chat tweaks, minimap tweaks, inspect range, ignore duels, auto-sell items... all those are completely unrelated and don't belong in the same addon. The "boilerplate code" is what the framework is there for... there's a reason ace addons are so popular both with users and devs, the framework covers the common stuff for you and gives a consistent behavior across addons.
IMCO, Minimalist should be a "compilation" of handy little addons... as much as I hate compilations. But hey, I'm only posting cause Sean threw out my name... by Internet rules I'm required to express my opinion now.
8-24-2008 @ 9:13PM
Iwanttobeasleep said...
Those kinds of addons are quite useful to new players or even old players new to using addons. It might seem pointless to you after you've picked up your 15 different addons but it saves people quite a bit of trouble finding the 15 ones to start.
8-25-2008 @ 3:35AM
JDM said...
"IMCO, Minimalist should be a "compilation" of handy little addons... as much as I hate compilations."
I don't mind such wide-variety compilations, so long as they are sublet'd into modules which I can disable/delete if I don't use a particular feature.
8-24-2008 @ 5:42PM
Aaron said...
I use it very much only for the auto resurrect, nothing else on it is useful, inFlight already does the dismount afaik as well, if there's a smaller mod that does only auto accept of resurrections i'd like to hear it :)
Reply
8-25-2008 @ 10:55AM
ivan256 said...
Obviously not a raider then?
You don't want to auto-accept a battle res... You want to wait until you're not going to die when you hit the button.
I don't know about "low memory footprint" either. For example, you can sell all greys with a macro. No add-on memory required.
Plus a lot of these features are sub-par compared to other options.. Chat & Rep add-ons come to mind.
8-24-2008 @ 5:53PM
Veji said...
HI BEAR! :)
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 7:11PM
Tekkub said...
omgwut?
8-24-2008 @ 6:43PM
jay said...
I've found "Do it all" addon's tend to create more errors than anything else, well more so than any other addon I have encountered.
I was also wondering, can malfunctioning addon's be part of the problem that creates the 134# error that can pop up from time to time?
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 6:43PM
boo said...
it's one of my "must have" mods, like my dhud... :)
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 7:05PM
Coldbear said...
Using it for a year or more now. Love this. Easily my favourite mod.
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 7:09PM
Thander said...
Some of those features have been added to the default UI.
Auto-Skip Useless Gossips - works unless the NPC has multiple interact options like an innkeeper.
Smart Taxi - doesn't auto-unshift Druids when talking to flight masters but does the other two things.
This is one reason why I like to use individual addons for each feature. I hate using an addon for something the game already does unless it's vastly better or makes the game less tedious.
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 7:47PM
Ametrine said...
...but I liked the "useless gossips"... :,-(
8-24-2008 @ 10:16PM
Jack said...
It's one of the oldest addons in my addon folder, and I still don't know what I'd do without it. The chat improvements are my favourite.
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 10:51PM
Koskun said...
@ Iwanttobeasleep:
But, you can give them this one mod, that does 15 things, or give them (glancing over what Minimilist does) about 5 or so mods that do 3 things each, thus making the learning curve easier.
Reply
8-24-2008 @ 11:39PM
Mythor said...
I use Automaton (another Ace mod) to do all the useful things of Minimalist plus other useful things like auto-declining group/guild invites from non-friends.
However I would consider dropping Automaton in favour of Minimalist if Minimalist actually tells you who the Duel requests are coming from so abusers can be reported. I added an identifier to Automaton's once but I'd have to keep redoing it any time I updated or I'd have to make my own version of the auto-decliner module. Pain in the ass and not worth the time in the end.
Reply
8-25-2008 @ 4:20AM
Muskie said...
I try and keep things as simple as I can, and I've found my Auctioneer/Cartographer/QuestHelper/LightHeaded/SCT Combo to be the best for me. Little big on the memory footprint though. Anyone know any streamlined alternatives?
Reply
11-07-2008 @ 4:14AM
Eisenglut said...
Hm... you could replace Questhelper with TomTom (for the arrow) and Tourguide (for quest help).
Saves about 15MB with me.
Eisenglut