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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    What is obvious?; Context sensitive sidebars.
From:       Sven Burmeister <sven.burmeister () gmx ! net>
Date:       2005-03-12 1:35:56
Message-ID: 200503120235.57805.sven.burmeister () gmx ! net
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Hello everybody!

I have had some experience now, introducing different kinds of users to KDE. 
The problems I encountered made me think about possible solutions in order to 
ease access to KDE for beginners, steepen their learning curve, as well as 
improve usability for advanced users.

Let me start with an example: Do you think the K at the bottom-left of the 
desktop is obvious in regards to it containing applications? To me it is. Yet 
actually it is not. A K has no obvious connection to the term applications, 
the position is just known if people got "educated" by MS and some distros 
even change the icon, so that one cannot say: click the K. In order to find 
the applications, the user has to hover the icons (if tooltips are enabled), 
read docs, or use trial and error. Obvious would be an icon accompanied by 
the word "applications" written out, as this mediates the functionality 
without any action or knowledge required to "unhide" it. Although this 
example might seem a bit exaggerated, I think that it shows that the best GUI 
is a GUI that does not need any explanation, especially for basic 
functionality such as an Applications-Menu or Copy To... there should be no 
need to be told how it works, read a manual or perform some trial and error 
surveys. That home icon should also be called: files.

From my experience there are three kind of users, which have all to be 
considered. First, users that are reluctant to learn/understand/remember 
anything about the software they are working with. They just want it to work. 
Their needs are limited to some file management, PIM, word-processing and 
maybe playing video/audio. There are quite a few of this kind around, 
especially in offices, so in order to get KDE ready for office they have to 
be taken into account. It's easy to forget about them because they will never 
ask in any IRC or file bugs.
Second, beginners that want to learn/understand/remember. They have the same 
needs as the former type, when starting with KDE, yet need/want help to 
become advanced. In order to ease their learning and steepen their learning 
curve, basic functionality has to be written out, e.g. Applications next to 
the K, Copy Selected Files To... in Konqueror and so on. They are not to fond 
of reading docs, neither do they like to use trial and error or right 
mouse-button.
Third, advanced users. Because of their background knowledge they do not need 
basic functionalities to be written out, in fact it would hinder them, yet 
even for those my idea has a lot of benefits in gathering context-sensitively 
functionalities and information right next to the active window.

The Beginners GUI.
All basic functionalities must be written out and accessible via the left 
mouse-button, i.e. not hidden in (context-)menus, just icons toolbars or 
shortcuts. This is impossible to put into an application, as has been pointed 
out regarding email-sorting-colums in a previous post. So there has to be 
some extra space attached, if needed, a context sensitive sidebar. Attached 
to the side of the active window the user finds written out: Copy Selected 
Files To... (The question why it does not make sense to have the sidebar at 
the side of the screen rather than attached to the window is answered in the 
wiki-article below) If the user clicks on it without having fulfilled the 
pre-requisite of selecting files, a small window pops up explaining that one 
has to hold down the left mouse-button in order to draw a frame around the 
filenames to be selected. That amount of information is enough for user type 
one. Yet user type two wants to learn more in order to advance, so one offers 
a link: Tell Me More..., which expands the pop-up and explains the user which 
keyboard-shortcuts are available, as well as how to use drag&drop and maybe 
even in which (context-)menu to find it. This kind of help should also be 
available when clicking on the functionality with What's this?. The written 
out functionality should be accompanied by an icon in order to connect icon 
and functionality. Kmail would for example have Reply To... written out and 
the icon next to it.

The advanced GUI
As I mentioned before, advanced users do not need basic functionality written 
out, so for them the GUI must adapt, i.e. be configurable. Further this kind 
of user will profit from the advanced features of a Context Sidebar. For 
example in konqueror one would have a d&d list in order to collect files 
across directories/apps and perform a task on them, such as burn to CD, 
print, send, generate playlist, compress etc. Obviously the available actions 
are offered context-sensitive in order not to spam the GUI. If there are no 
pictures in the list, slideshow won't be available.
In Kontact the Context Sidebar would gather information, as well as offer 
functionalities for a selected email, such as show contact details for the 
sender with the possibility to call/chat with just a click. This is 
especially useful in a corporate environment when you need an overview of 
information, contact-details and emails send/received for a certain customer.

For developers the Context-Sidebar would offer a space for extensions. Often 
features get rejected because they are not useful to a big enough group of 
users and thus not worth maintaining in the app's source. Having the 
Context-Sidebar plug-ins/extensions can easily be placed right next to the 
app by third party developers. An example for this would be many users' wish 
to see the chat-partners' photos in full size within kopete. If there was a 
Context-Sidebar, this feature could be offered by anyone interested in it as 
extension.

I have described the idea in more detail at wiki.kde.org, so please feel free 
to comment on it in order to improve the idea. I think this would be a 
killerfeature for KDE 4. You might want to skip the paragraphs: What is 
obvious ff. And start reading again at Examples, as those are the same as in 
this email.
Apart from the comments my questions would be, would it be useful to write a 
dot.kde.org article about this? Who do I have to talk to, to find out what 
needs to be done to accomplish it, i.e. which bits of code needed are already 
available, what is missing and so on. Unfortunately I am no programmer, 
otherwise this would have been started already.

Thanks for your attention!

Sven

http://wiki.kde.org/tiki-index.php?page=KDE+Context-Sidebar
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