Re: Re: [libreoffice-design] Shaken, not Stirred (Topics)

Am Samstag, 29. Januar 2011, 20:05:06 schrieb Christoph Noack:
> Cool! Now, we really need Björn and you talking to the community via the
> blog ... there is still a lot of marketing that is required to finally
> prove "UX and Usability" to be an important part of the LibreOffice
> development :-)
>
> Björn, Paulo, do you both have a blog?

I do - see my footer (not being an utterly active writer though). What needs 
to happen to get my blog aggreated to http://planet.documentfoundation.org/
??? (Ok, next to me starting to blog about LibO :))

> > But when you compares the wizard approach with the tabbed one, it's
> > clear the first one do focus in user and its "insert/edit a field" task,
> > while the second one do focus in developer and his point of view: "there
> > are many types of field and you need pick up the correct one". I'm not a
> > professional, but this is my thinking. What do you think?
>
> Without that much in-depth knowledge, I totally agree to your analysis.
> Maybe adding one minor additional thought - on the one hand, there are
> pretty common and rather simple tasks (inserting page numbers, inserting
> chapter names, referring to picture titles), and the more difficult ones
> (referring to database stuff). Concerning the latter, there may be
> people who are happy to simply enter field stuff - because it's
> efficient.
>
> The current advantage: all tasks are handled via the same interface /
> workflow. So if you know how to do, it is efficient to apply the
> available knowledge for a variety of field types. The problem the wizard
> tries to address (in my understanding), is to address less experienced
> people who want to work with more difficult field types. Here, the
> correct result is more important than the number of steps.

I actually disagree with your analysis here. The current appraoch is neither 
fish nor flesh. Neither the process of selecting a certain field not the 
interface to configure it are optimized, consistent or even transparent. 
Splitting this up into a two step: 1. Wizard to select the field and 2. 
Provide optimized interfaces for configuration of the different fields will 
address more and less experienced users in the same way, because it will 
provide a consistent and transperent way to select the field you need and a 
suitable interface to configure it. It does not even need to be more steps 
than before - they only need to be presented in a much clearer manner.

Hopefully tomorrow I will find the time to illustrate my words.

> So, if we change the behavior, we should also make sure that power users
> feel at home as well. Here, some people in the German community might
> help ...

Testing with and feedback from as many people as possible is always essential!

Best,
Björn

-- 
Voluntary Open Source Usability: http://www.OpenUsability.org
Commercial Open Source Usability: http://www.OpenSource-Usability-Labs.com


-- 
Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+help@libreoffice.org
List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/
*** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***