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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: [KDE Usability] Users cannot find where to "safely remove" USB
From:       Dotan Cohen <dotancohen () gmail ! com>
Date:       2010-04-04 22:09:16
Message-ID: w2v880dece01004041509l7759ca22v47327f0cd1ac6498 () mail ! gmail ! com
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> First off, lighten up your tone,

Thank you Shaun, I did not realize that my tone was not light. It may
that I exercise English only in type, never in person, so I have not
properly developed my sugar-coating skills. If you care to mention
specifically where I was not light off-list, I would very much
appreciate it and I will make an effort to improve. My goal is
communication, naturally, and if I am failing at that then I need to
know.


> perhaps it is just me that was not fond of
> it (and has not ever been), but developers do not want to hear your
> all-knowing-decisions, and I especially do not. This is a discussion, *not*
> a place for you to tell us how it should be done.

I made no decision, nor did I tell how it should be done. In the only
place where I mentioned a change (the OP), I labelled those two
changes as suggestions. In fact, I take offence in your accusation
that I make "all-knowing-decisions" as I explicitly asked in the OP
what the list members think. Clearly my intention was to ask the list
members' opinions and not push my own opinion. I answered every post
with clear, well-defined arguments in favour of my proposal and still
asked for counter-arguments. I stressed that was expressing opinion in
the single message where I disadvantages of UI elements came up, and
furthermore stressed that my own opinion is no more valid than that of
the person who thinks differently than I do.

Where do you see "all-knowing-decisions"?


> Maybe I am overreacting,
> but I receive this same feeling towards many of your bug reports/topics,
> which is not to say that they do not make good points, just that there are
> seemingly better methods to make them.
>

Again, I would very much appreciate specific clarification off-list.
You don't _have_ to, but if I am made aware of the flaws in my methods
then I will work hard to fix them.


> Also bear in mind, that I am not against adding the context menu action for
> this. It is merely that I, like most developers, try to make sensical
> decisions to understand the outcome of either action. It is not our job to
> jump on the first decision we find.
>

Of course. I did not expect anyone to jump up and code it right away.
I came asking for opinions to develop a more intuitive interface. So
far, in addition to the two proposals I made (context menu item,
and/or additional action item), one other proposal had been made: add
the same paradigm to Dolphin. I dispute that proposal, but of course I
expect other proposals to be made.


>> What would be strange about that experience?
>
> On second thought, I've changed my mind..that was my opinion anyways, in
> case it wasn't clear.
>

All right.


>> Although I agree that _unnecessary_ items should not be added to the
>> view, I have these counter arguments:
>> 1) Ejecting the medium is not unnecessary. It is a common use case.
>
> Right, but if there are better solutions for it, I would prefer to not
> resort to the (imo) worst conclusion (referring to adding an additional
> item).
>

So let's think of another solution. Ideas? How about the context menu item?


>> 3) If the free space is so rare that adding a single, important menu
>> item is problematic then that is a sign that the space usage is a bad
>> design to begin with.
>
> Not really. You are being torn between doing what is easy and what is the
> best approach.

If a better approach can be had, then I am in favour. Which approach
would that be?


> Don't confuse hesitance with relentlessness towards
> preventing the addition of items.
>

I see. As this is a discussion, I thought it best to answer resistance
to the idea with counter arguments. Maybe I shouldn't do that.


>> [..] Really? You think that having an intuitive UI is less
>> important then...
>
> Oh great, word injections. How fun.
>

That is because you said "at all costs", so I mentioned a worst-case
scenario. Your offence at my statement is further proof that I am not
communicating effectively, it was my intention to show that "at all
costs" was the ridiculous standpoint, it was _not_ my intention to
inject words into your mouth. I apologize for not making that clear.


>> > ...hopefully the eject button being added to the
>> > places view can help clear up some confusion.
>> >
>>
>> It won't,
>
> That's amazing, you've learned how to traverse the events of Time? You're
> making blind assumptions by extrapolating on existing data. That data is
> basing it's correctness on the mere fact that it can scale. Once again, this
> is another opinion that feels like not.
>

I don't follow you. Many of the users I talked to do not interact with
the USB media via Dolphin, and therefore would never see the change
that supposedly would fix the issue. For instance, my mother in law
connects her camera, clicks "Download with Digikam", and that is the
end of it. She pulls the cable out when she's done without unmounting.
In fact, I suspect that she has _never_ used a file manager. Other
that Digikam, everything she does is online.


>> because of the two users that knew to eject from Dolphin
>>
>> (and therefore would be the only ones who would see the eject button
>> there),
>
> Huh? What are you talking about? I think you just argued against yourself
> for non-addition of the context menu action, by saying that only 2 users
> knew how to eject from Dolphin (which is only accessible from the context
> menu).
>

I argue that the context menu item _should_ be added! So far as I
remember, every single person tried right-clicking on the items in
Device Manager. That is where people are looking, that is where the
action should be.


>> they now both know about the eject button in the Device
>> Notifier and _still_ find it unintuitive.
>
>
> That's because it is not used all over the place (like the KFilePlacesView,
> which was what I was talking about..). Of course it will be "unintuitive" if
> it used in less than all of the situations wherein they are presented
> devices and actions associated with them..
>

I understand that argument that adding it in more places will make it
more obvious. While I do not dispute that, I counter-argued that it
would solve all (or even most) use cases.


>> And no, he is not an idiot. He is a Microsoft
>> engineer (and uses Kubuntu at home!).
>
> Don't care; irrelevant.
>

I agree, I added that only in anticipation of childish "he's an idiot
if he can't $foobar" responses.


> I must press you to look at this image, if you for some reason think that we
> are the only ones who do this.. http://tinyurl.com/yzsa4mk
>

I suspected that it was a Mac paradigm. Furthermore, I use Nautilus
often due to a longstanding bug in Konqueror/Dolphin, and it is used
there as well.


> The eject icon and the associated action is quite straight-forward. It is a
> metaphor used all over in the world of computing and a very good one, if I
> may say so myself.
>

Not all users are well versed in the world of computing. In fact, many
of the Kubuntu installs that I perform are for people who hate
computers. They are sick of malware (what they call "viruses") on
their current OS and want something that "just works". Think about
that: Linux is now the refuge for people who want a simple computing
experience!


> Anyways...it would be interesting to find out if part of the issue is the
> fact that the eject icon changes it's visiblity based on the mouseover
> status. I could see how it could be a bit unexpected: i.e. it's difficult to
> find that which you can't initially see.
>

I can tell you that it is part of the issue. Yesterday I showed a user
where the eject button is, and today he could not find it. So making
it always visible would have helped in that case.


> But then again, I would also assume that the user has to mouse over the
> device anyways to see what actions he wants to do with it (even if it were
> right clicking).
>

I can only suspect that one of two things occurred (I can ask him if
you like, but not now as it's too late to call):
1) When he moused over he immediately clicked, and did not look at
what appeared in the main window,
 - or -
2) Too many interface items appeared in the main window (description,
free space, eject button), so he missed the one he was looking for.

Maybe making those mouse-over bits always visible would help.


-- 
Dotan Cohen

http://bido.com
http://what-is-what.com

Please CC me if you want to be sure that I read your message. I do not
read all list mail.
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