Hi,
I wanted to know if I'm the only one confused by the new "Share" menu
and how things migrated from "Collection" to "Share". Some question to
the design team:
- I think the distinction between a shared collection and a collection
subscribed read/write is lost on the user at the UI level at least. OK,
the first one is in your Cosmo account while the other is someone else's
account but, apart from that, is there any other difference? Does it
warrant to have 2 different menu items to "Unsubscribe/Unpublish" them
(they are mutually exclusive)? FWIW, the effect of Unsubscribe and
Unpublish is essentially the same for the user (keep a version of the
collection local, don't sync anymore)
- I know that we resisted using "Publish" in favor of "Share" as a verb
(though you can push something to Cosmo without sharing it with
anyone...). But why then is the opposite action of "Share" named
"Unpublish"?
- I feel very confusing to have the "Sync All" actions under the "Share"
menu, especially wrt to email. That's not where I instinctively looked
for it. It was under "Collection" before (not great either). May be
those "global network actions" should be under "File" (sort of a catch
all menu).
- "Take offline" really confused me. I though is was a sort of
"unpublish" at first. I mean, taking something offline usually means
taking it out of a server, not suspending communication entirely. Or may
be the thinking was about the machine (as in "take this machine
offline"). Having this under Share though didn't help. Renaming it "Go
offline" seems less ambiguous (especially since it applies to other
things than collection sharing)
- The use of separators feels a little arbitrary. e.g., under the
Collection menu, why is "rename" grouped with "new" and separated from
"collection color"? Looks like "rename" and "collection color" are of
the same level (change attributes of the currently active collection),
while "new" is clearly a generic action.
To cut through the chase, here's my proposal:
Collection:
New Collection
Subscribe...
------
Rename
Change color
Add <collection> to Dashboard
Notes:
- Separate generic from actions that apply to the active collection
- "Subscribe" seems better suited here than under "Share" since it's
creating a collection locally. After all, it's not shared as long as
it's not even subscribed...
- Use action verb for color ("Change") instead of substantive
("Collection color")
Share:
Share <collection>
Unsubscribe/Unpublish <collection>
Sync <collection>
Manage <collection>
Copy sharing ticket(s) to Clipboard
------
Restore published shares...
Freebusy
Notes:
- Separate actions that apply to the active collection from actions that
apply to the user's whole set of collections
- One single menu item for Unpublish/Unsubscribe
- Use "sharing ticket" instead of "URL" (though we might trade a
jargonic term for another, at least it sort of hint at what this URL
will do...)
- Use the name of the collection instead of "Share" in the "Manage" item
(that applies only to the active collection)
- Assumes "Sync all", "Go offline" and "Set Auto-sync intervals..." are
moved to the File menu
Cheers,
- Philippe
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