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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: View modes in konqueror
From:       Peter Postmus <p.postmus () st ! hanze ! nl>
Date:       2004-04-19 18:40:37
Message-ID: 200404192040.37692.p.postmus () st ! hanze ! nl
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On Monday 19 April 2004 18:57, Leo Savernik wrote:
> > It is complicated for a user to handle that kind of buttons. And even for
> > a "power" user, it is not convenient to open the popup menu to choose one
> > of the "fancier" modes.
> >
> > Current solution:
> > + fast switching between icon view and tree view
> > - difficult (or annoying) to choose another view in the popup
> > - many buttons (typically 4-5 depending on applications)
> >
> > Proposal (only 1 view button):
> > + easy to select a view mode
> > + only 1 button (with a simple icon, an "eye" for example)
> > - needs 2 clicks to switch from icon view to tree view
> >
> > I prefer the 2nd solution, it is much easier to use and prevents the
> > toolbar from being full. Another problem with the current approach is
> > that on most configuration, you don't see the description on toolbar
> > buttons.
>
> And how is the second solution easier in terms of usability for the power
> user? He has a much longer list to traverse then. Otherwise, usability is
> exactly the same: click, drag, release above suitable item.

Except that in the first case, there are two buttons which configure the same 
thing: the way files are represented. Two buttons is bad, because it confuses 
people. They have a 50% chance of clicking on the "wrong" button (they look 
very similar). If that happens, some of them will think Konqueror can't 
display files the way they want it to. Others will click the second button, 
drag and release the mouse above the suitable item.

So average users will need to perform the action twice for 50% of the time. 
Over time, they will learn the difference between the buttons. But the fact 
still remains that having two buttons for configuring the same thing is bad, 
usability-wise. (Maybe it's not the same thing to you, but my guess is that 
it is to most people).

>
> > When clicking on the icon view button, you don't really know if it will
> > activate "Icon view" or "Multicolumn view". Same thing for "Info list
> > view" and "Detailed list view", so I don't even thing the 1st solution is
> > faster...
>
> Hover over it. Then you get a tooltip which tells you the mode it is going
> to activate.

So users must hold their mouse over the button and wait before they get to see 
what the function of that button is? Not very good IMO (see my arguments for 
not having two view mode-buttons above).

>
> And I repeat, the noob will never get the idea that there is a drop down
> menu, so for him, it's only two view modes that are readily and easily
> available (I remotely remember that even Wind*ws Explorer has two distinct
> buttons).

Yes he will. When he moves the mouse while clicking the button, the list 
allready appears. In addition, some themes display an arrow on the button.

>
> The power user should have enough brains to remember which mode he selected
> from the drop down a minute ago. If it had been a longer period, hovering
> is the way to go (or risk that the initial load is the wrong mode. But if
> the time savings due to distinct buttons are greater than the loss of
> misloadings, they should be kept).
>
> Additionally, konqueror remembers the selected view mode for directories.
> Therefore, most of the time it is really only a matter between switching
> the Icon View part and the List View part, and both will automagically do
> "the right thing".
>
> The way it currently is, I nearly never (at least I cannot remember when I
> did it last) need the drop down menus at all, but I need switching between
> list view and icon view quite frequently.

The "Tree View", "Detailed List View" and "Text View" all display the 
following information:

- Name
- Size
- File Type
- Modified (date)
- Permissions
- Owner
- Group
- Link

I suggest combining these views into a single "List View" mode, which - if 
people feel this is necessary - can be modified in the Konqueror 
configuration window to incorporate features from the aforementioned modes. 
In that case, "Info List View" could also disappear.

This will shorten the amount of choices under a single button from six to four 
or even three. I think your argument of power users having to long a list to 
traverse, would be solved by this.

Now that I think of it, I wonder what's the point of having a directory tree 
in the file viewing pane while there's allready a tree in the navigation 
pane. Can somebody explain?


Another thing: the increase/decrease icon size buttons are not present when 
choosing "Text View", because there are no icons in this mode. However, this 
causes the position of the "View" buttons to change. When a user accidentally 
chooses a view mode he or she doesn't really want (which happens very easily, 
due to the amount of view modes - even I still make that mistake, having used 
used KDE since 1998), the buttons could have moved. So the user needs to 
re-scan the entire toolbar, find the appropriate icon, and than re-click it. 
IMO this is very bad usability.

-- 
Met vriendelijke groeten,
With kind regards,

Peter Postmus

WWW: http://starbase218.ath.cx
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