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List:       koffice-devel
Subject:    Re: Question about your KPresenter's review
From:       Catherine Olanich Raymond <cathy () thyrsus ! com>
Date:       2002-02-12 3:24:19
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On Monday 11 February 2002 04:31 am, David Faure wrote:
> On Monday 11 February 2002 07:42, Catherine Olanich Raymond wrote:
> > On Sunday 10 February 2002 08:15 am, David Faure wrote:

> > I will do so.  Thank you.  As I just pointed out to Thomas Zander in
> > respond to a posting by him, though, an end user is not likely to think
> > of trolling the Web for information on an application.  Perhaps more to
> > the point, an end user who finds that the program interface and on-line
> > help do not enlighten them about how to use the program's basic features
> > is likely to throw his or her hands up in frustration *before* getting
> > around to looking on the Web for information and guidance.
>
> You got me wrong! I never said users should go onto a website to find
> documentation! I was just saying that the next version will come with
> improved documentation, and that if you wanted to have a look at the
> current state on the documentation you could find that on webcvs.kde.org!

Please.  Take it easy!  

I did not intend to impute any particular intention to your passing that Web 
pointer to me, and if I did I apologize.

I am glad that the next version will have improved documentation.  That is a 
good thing.  

But please understand that I am passing on my reactions, not to condemn the 
KDE group, or chastise the developers.  I'm doing it to show you a 
non-technical user's *first* view.  Since the developers are very familiar 
with the program, it is harder for them to see it as a new and non-technical 
person might see it.



> > >  But since the UI needs to be improved first, as you noted
> > > (same work as the one that was done on KWord, cleaning up menus and
> > > toolbars), it'd be a better idea to do that first, before finishing the
> > > documentation.
> >
> > I have mixed feelings about this.  I believe the UI needs to be improved.
> >  On the other hand, KPresenter is out there *now*, and it does perform
> > the basic tasks--if the user can only figure out how to do so.  Fixing
> > the documentation first will give users incentives to try using
> > KPresenter now. If you fix the program first, you may find that the users
> > who might have been willing to give it a try have already given up on it.
>
> I don't think it's a good idea to write documentation about "a crippled
> UI".

Did Eric refer to the UI as "crippled"?  I don't believe that I did.  Anyway, 
I think you missed my point.  

I agree that there would be no reason to write documentation about a 
"crippled UI" *if* the developers' intent was to completely redo the 
UI--especially if the program were still in alpha test and few potential 
users were going to run into the (soon to be discarded) "crippled" version.

However, it's not my understanding that a complete overhaul of KPresenter is 
contemplated (if I'm mistaken, let me know!).  KPresenter is out there.  It's 
available to users, and users are encountering it.  Users other than me, Eric 
and Rob likely are having problems with it.  Some of those problems could be 
lessened by improving the documentation.  Lessening those problems in that 
manner would, I believe, create goodwill for KPresenter/KDE generally by 
demonstrating the development team's interest in helping the program work 
better for the users.



> > > The current work on KPresenter includes zoom support, and using the
> > > same text-formatting object as KWord, bringing WYSIWYG, more
> > > fine-grained text-formatting options (e.g. different types of paragraph
> > > in the same text object etc.)
> >
> > All of these sound like improvements.  If you like, you can send me the
> > current version and I will happily attempt to use it, see whether I run
> > into any other problems/bugs, and let you know about them.
>
> I can't "send it to you". KOffice CVS requires Qt3 and KDE3, and KPresenter
> is under heavy development... better wait a bit. But if you can compile
> source code or if you can get Eric to do it ;), you can always grab the
> latest stuff using anoncvs (http://www.kde.org/anoncvs.html)

Okay, that's fine.  Thank you.  See, I simply don't always know what is easy 
to do, and what is hard, or inconvenient, with regard to obtaining new 
versions of a program that's under "heavy development."  Part of the burden 
of being a user, I guess.  :-)




> > But  David, that's the point.  :-)  *You* had no problem using the
> > program because you helped write it, and understood what features were
> > available and how to use them.
>
> No, I started using it BEFORE I hacked it. I only fixed a few things that
> were needed at the time, but I'm not person who initially developer
> KPresenter. I found it quite nice to use even before I had any idea about
> its source code.

Okay.  I did not know that.  

On the other hand, you knew enough to be able to "fix things".  I do not have 
that kind of knowledge.  As an end user, I don't know enough to know why a 
program does things in a particular way, or even how to find out why a 
program does things in a particular way.  I can only describe the fruits of 
my experience of attempting to use it.  


> > Out of curiosity, which other "applications for making presentations"
> > have you tried to use?
>
> Powerpoint.

Interesting.  

The law office where I work runs Windows NT and uses all Windows/DOS 
applications.  However, because I don't usually need presentation software, I 
did not attempt to experiment with PowerPoint until after I had attempted to 
use KPresenter.  KPresenter was the first presentation software package I 
ever used.



> > I had never used a presentations application before my experience with
> > KPresenter.  However, afterward I experimented a little with MS
> > PowerPoint--and found text editing, at least, to be a lot easier to
> > deduce and less frustrating.
>
> Doesn't powerpoint work the same way? Click on object to move it,
> double-click on it to edit it ?

I don't have PowerPoint on the machine I am answering you e-mail from, and 
I don't remember enough of my experiment with PP to answer your question 
fairly.  I'll take another swing at PowerPoint at the office tomorrow and let 
you know what I think.

-- 
Cathy Raymond <cathy@thyrsus.com>

"The meeting of personalities is like the contact of chemical substances; 
if there is any reaction, both are transformed."  Carl Jung
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