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List:       kde-bugs-dist
Subject:    [Bug 8333] setting 'home page' is unintuitive
From:       James Richard Tyrer <tyrerj () Acm ! Org>
Date:       2006-02-28 21:54:39
Message-ID: 20060228215439.20221.qmail () ktown ! kde ! org
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------- Additional Comments From tyrerj acm org  2006-02-28 22:54 -------
> many computer users actually fear using a file browser beyond "my documents"
> because they think they will break something.

Probably true, and somewhat odd since on a properly installed Linux system, they can't break \
anything outside of their HOME directory.  Actually, the one place where they can break \
something is in their HOME directory (and the so-called hidden subdirectories) which is why I \
suggest that the default setup have the local Home point to "~/Files" (which corresponds to "My \
Documents" -- people say it doesn't, but check a Windows installation).  That is where my Home \
button points.

I see some issues with what you propose.  From a usability perspective, it isn't a good idea to \
have states because the user might forget which state their in (ambiguous states are worse).  \
Our current setup lets you go to the web in the "file manager" and manage files in the "web \
browser"  This is not good and I don't see anyway to change this.  Even if we had profiles that \
would change based on the protocol (HTTP, FTP, FILE, etc.) it would still be best to have two \
HOME buttons (web home and "My Documents"), otherwise, you would need to have some way to \
change the mode of the browser in order to go to the HOME that you wanted.

> web-browser mode (http:// or ftp://.  

I don't think so.  Currently we use the file manager (the KFM part) for FTP, should we change \
this?  This is a further confusion for users.

I am also asserting that another source of confusion is that users seem to think that web \
browsing and local browsing are different things.  This would be OK as long as it doesn't \
result in ambiguous states.  My suggestion to avoid this issue is to have profiles based on the \
protocol in use.  If this were the case then clicking on one of the two Home buttons would also \
select (indirectly) the profile to be used.

Note that this needs to be setup so that users don't have to use different profiles if they \
don't want to.  I suggest that there be a default "Browser" profile which would be used unless \
one were defined for the protocol being used.  If profiles are used in this way, saving URLs \
would need to be a separate function.


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