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[Malkthius]

If you are viewing a dwarf ('v' from the unit list, or putting the cursor near a dwarf and pressing 'v-z' elsewhere) and press 'y' you get to a screen where you can give the dwarf a nickname or a custom profession name.

Currently, this screen is mostly empty, and I think that it would make a great place to manage labors.

I propose that the new customize screen look something like this:

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

The "Customize Nickname" and "Customize Profession Name" would remain unchanged.

The "Customize Icon" and "Customize Color" settings would allow you to set your dwarf to look a certain way, so that when your third High Master Fish Dissector shows up and you hand him a mining pick, you can make him light grey instead of dark blue.  Additionally, if you wanted your militia to look like soldiers all of the time instead of just when they're on duty, you could do that.

The "Next Dwarf" and "Previous Dwarf" part would let you cycle through all of your dwarves with the '+' and '-' keys without leaving this screen, which is the primary motivation for making these improvements.

Finally, you would be able to set a dwarf's labors while all of his skills are on screen.

While this system would not be as fully featured as Dwarven Therapist, or other 3rd party memory hacking labor management programs, it would be an enormous improvement over having to find each dwarf, view him, examine his skills, then switch to preferences and set his labors.

Also, (perhaps most importantly) I think that Toady could make these changes (except for maybe the icon/color stuff) relatively quickly and easily.

On a somewhat related note, if the dwarves were sorted, alphabetically, by profession name (taking into account custom profession names) in the military screen where you assign dwarves to squads, that would make building squads easier when your population gets into the hundreds.

[NAV]

This is brilliant. Malkthius this is a perfect idea without any flaws and would make the game much less frustrating. There would hardly even be a need for dwarf therapist anymore.

Yes yes I support this.

[hermes]

Wow, always great when suggestions come with mock ups, nice work!  I like the simplicity of merging existing options on one screen.  How about next to the labors there being the number of dwarves currently assigned to that labor? Next and prev dwarf is a great idea.  Perhaps a reset icon function might be useful if one wanted to go back to standard colours?

[Revanchist]

I think this is a suggestion Toady should give serious consideration towards. It has many practical benefits.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Seems like it should be easy. Wanna bet $25 that I'm wrong? 
Seriously, though, this sounds like a good idea.

[Blade Master Model 42]

Support.

[0cu]

I support this. I hate my haulers for their different colors.

[Rtyh-C]

Yes, this would be incredibly useful. But what about those who use graphics packs?

Still, I support this.

Edit:

On a somewhat related note, if the dwarves were sorted, alphabetically, by profession name (taking into account custom profession names) in the military screen where you assign dwarves to squads, that would make building squads easier when your population gets into the hundreds.

Support!

Actually, they should at least be sorted by something. Right now they seem to be completely random, or very close to it.

[GreatWyrmGold]

Yes, this would be incredibly useful. But what about those who use graphics packs?

What about them?

[OREOSOME]

Support!

[hermes]

On second thought, a screen like this has good potential to becoming the labor management screen, and could include extra information such as the dwarf's physical and mental condition, and their likes and dislikes - just a couple of phrases from the status screen - to help the player choose appropriate jobs...??

[parlor_tricks]

On second thought, a screen like this has good potential to becoming the labor management screen, and could include extra information such as the dwarf's physical and mental condition, and their likes and dislikes - just a couple of phrases from the status screen - to help the player choose appropriate jobs...??

feature creep on the first page?

In that case, toady may pick it up after he's done a new stuff adding cycle and gets onto a fix stuff cycle

[Mechanixm]

There would hardly even be a need for dwarf therapist anymore.

Hey, let's not get crazy.

This is an incredibly good idea, though.  I would love to see something like this implemented.

[rethnor]

Also, (perhaps most importantly) I think that Toady could make these changes (except for maybe the icon/color stuff) relatively quickly and easily.

Please remove this idea from you cranium. As a developer I usually cringe whenever someone says this, more often than not the opposite is true. Just an FYI

[katana]

Also, (perhaps most importantly) I think that Toady could make these changes (except for maybe the icon/color stuff) relatively quickly and easily.

Please remove this idea from you cranium. As a developer I usually cringe whenever someone says this, more often than not the opposite is true. Just an FYI

As another (admittedly newbish) programmer, this is one of the few times where I slightly agree with the original post. I mean, it won't be completely painless, but relatively to all the other stuff done, it's nothing. Note that I'm talking about labor management here, not the whole dwarves get different symbols thing, order them or anything.

Right now you can use the v key to view this info on the newest dwarf. If you displayed that information on the settings section of that dwarf, slightly changing the way you render the information (move it to a different location) and have the dwarf being viewed be set to whatever dwarf you're customizing... It actually sounds simple on paper, if Toady's done this similarly to how I'm guessing.