Preview when not dragging

[Fabio]

[qBisonauthor=jamespetts link=topic=9449.msg88610#msg88610 date=133050]
How exactly would the cost of this be represented to a player before embarking on these potentially expensive projects?
[/quote]

This question from James gave me an idea, also exploited in some commercial game.

It applies mostly to
- bridges and
- tunnels,
but it can be extended also to
- stations
- second click of way building.

When using these tools, if the cursor stays on a tile for more than  seconds:
- check if the tile is ok for selected tool
    - NO: turn the cursor red
    - YES:
        - turn the cursor green
        - calculate the preview as if clicking on that tile
        - display preview (like for dragging)
        - show tooltip with expected cost
Moving the cursor to another tile would just cancel.

[Isaac Eiland-Hall]

Actually, hover-time is one idea, but I did have another that was sparked by the idea of mobile devices and the lack of CTRL key...

Perhaps there could be one or more "modifier" or "mode" buttons on the main toolbar. They would not be tools, per se, but more like a CTRL button: Click one to toggle it "on", and it would act similarly to holding CTRL key down.

So, I suppose, it might be considered an "alternate mode" button. And there could be a key bound to toggle the alt on or off, for keyboard users, but always an on-screen button to indicate status and for mouse users

Ideas - some practical, some less practical:

1. alt mode on, hovering a bridge tool over a tile would show the cost to build a bridge, and give a preview (partially transparent) of the bridge it would build - or show an X cursor to indicate no bridge could be built there

2. alt mode on, click-and-drag buttons in a toolbar to rearrange them, and Simutrans would remember the changes. This one is more work, but it would be really sweet to be able to do this!  I'm inspired to go make an extension request on this right now!

3. alt-mode on, clicking info on a tile might load in reverse order

Essentially, anything done with CTRL key right now could be done with ALT-button clicked...