Hi Dan, please see more in-line:
On Mar 23, 2007, at 2:47 PM, Dan Dawson wrote:
* Clean and Simple UI - There are still icons that I don't really
know what they do or how they work. My fault for not reading
documentation but... I never read the docs on Google Cal or iCal
either ;-)
Yes, this is our goal. I don't think it makes sense to strive for
anything else :o) But Clean and Simple are deep and wide concepts
that can be interpreted in many different ways.
When evaluating Chandler's design, I think it's more appropriate to
compare it to
+ Outlook
+ Entourage
+ Lotus Notes
+ Ecco Pro
+ Evolution
+ Palm Desktop
or if you're more familiar with Google and Apple i-Products:
+ Gmail + Google Calendar
+ Apple Mail + iCal
Chandler is on it's way to being an integrated PIM rather than just a
calendar.
Given that perspective,
+ Single toolbar that stays the same no matter what context you're in
+ Single sidebar that stays the same no matter what context you're in
+ Single detail view that stays the same no matter what context
you're in
+ There are so few buttons that we are able to have a 'large-icon
toolbar' like Apple Mail
By contrast, in Outlook or Entourage, as you flip between the
context, everything changes. You essentially have to learn 4 or 5
different applications (depending on how many areas you actually use).
As for the icons, it's a problem we're definitely aware of and hoping
to iterate on heavily with the dogfood feedback we get from Preview.
(But functioning tooltips would help. :o)
In the meantime, here's a break down of all the icons in the app.
(Having owned icons on a PIM before, the list below is tiny in
comparison.)
+ All items
+ Mail
+ Tasks or Add to Task list (same glyph)
+ Calendar
+ New
+ Sync
+ Reply or Needs reply (same glyph)
+ Forward
+ Trash
+ Collection label: Tag
+ Overlayed collection: Check on a lozenge
+ Offline: Thunderbolt
+ In: Down arrow (Applies to both messages and sharing.)
+ Out or Send: Right arrow (Same glyph.) (Applies to both messages
and sharing.)
+ Subsequent Update or Send Update: U-shaped arrow (Same glyph.)
+ Draft: Broken up arrow tail. (This treatment is applied to Inbound,
Outbound and Update messages)
+ Alert: ! in a triangle (Applies to both email and sharing.)
+ Non-message, Unread item: Dot
+ Address an item: Person
+ Schedule a time: Clock
+ Add a reminder: Vibration
+ Lock an item (Never share it): Lock
+ Read-only: Pencil with a slash through it
* Drop or hide some of the "features" if people happen to not want
them, and probably reduce their priorities on development until
primary features are more operational. It is *very* doubtful most
of my users will consider switching their Mail applications to
Chandler any time soon, I love Mac Mail, I loved Thunderbird before
that... it's going to have to be a major advantage for me to
consider leaving one of those for a new application. Perhaps a
"lite" version of Chandler that was Calendar and Tasks only would
be faster to develop and deploy to a group of "real world" users.
An easy to use cross-platform calendar could really take off it
would seem, especially if it played well with iCal and Exchange,
and helped people realize on their own that it was *better* than
both of those through use and functionality.
We too do not expect users to abandon their current Mail clients in
favor of Chandler in the Preview timeframe. But we realized that
Communications was an essential part of Calendaring, Task management
and Sharing, so the Mail features are there as a way to support those
other workflows. For more on our Mail strategy, please see: http://
wiki.osafoundation.org/Journal/EmailStrategyWorkflows
I understand the powerful nature of having one monster application
that "does it all" but Calendars, Mail, RSS, Tasks, Flickr
searching and Amazon Wish Lists... all could be powerful but I'd
aim for proving the product in the market before going to that
level of detail. Doing one thing "right" is much more powerful
than doing a lot of things in a mediocre fashion when it comes to
winning new users.
I can understand how seeing things like RSS and Flickr and Amazon are
a bit overwhelming and make the app seem like it lacks focus.
However, I think we've defined focus along a different axis for the
project. We're not terribly concerned about the number of data
formats and data transport protocols the app supports. (Although for
Preview, we're targeting just a few: IMAP, POP, our own sharing
format, DAV and CalDAV, import/export for .ics.)
However, Chandler is designed (both at the UI layer and deeper down)
to eventually accommodate much more because we recognized that
people's daily information processing and task management workflows
don't respect boundaries defined around specific technologies. A
Microsoft Word document may represent a discrete item of work to a
lawyer whereas a JPG represents a discrete item of work for a
photographer. Who's to say which should and shouldn't be supported in
a first-class way by a PIM application?
We've decided that rather than focusing on specific technologies, we
would define Chandler's ultimate vision around workflows and usage
scenarios...in that way, we believe we're practicing user-centered
design.
So in that sense, we feel Chandler *is* narrowly focused, if in an
unfamiliar way: We're looking to build a workflow framework for
collecting, processing and managing information that is crucial to
what people consider 'work'. So we're not an MP3 player that has cool
sound effects and eye candy. But if you're a DJ (professional or
amateur) and you're working on putting together 3, 5, 43 playlists
for different events, then Chandler will hopefully one day be able to
bring your music into Chandler (in some form - it might be just as
pointers to playlist in some other app, we're not really sure yet)
and provide you with a way of keeping track of and making progress on
all that work. MP3s to this person is just as important as email or
task lists or meetings to another.
Of course I do have my own wish lists in addition to some of the
above:
* Custom calendar colors
* Floating events (they move forward day by day if not completed on
the previous day)
* Better searching of events
* More sharing preferences (Share title only, title and notes, busy
only, etc)
Yes! We have a long list of things we would like to have in
Chandler, including the items you've listed above. However, in the
context of Chandler as an integrated task and resource management /
collaboration system, it may begin to make more sense why some of
these basic calendaring features have not made it into Preview?
I hope this kind of feedback might in some small way be helpful,
again, I wanted to encourage the whole team, and if ever I learned
some Python I'd love to be a more direct part in helping out. If
ever I could be of assistance in providing feedback or thoughts
don't hesitate to let me know. I will continue trying to spread
Chandler through our building user by user and hopefully get enough
users on it that we might avoid the Exchange server all together :-)
High-level feedback is always welcome and your enthusiasm for the
project is greatly appreciated!
In the meantime, if you're looking for a more active outlet for your
energy, the best way you can contribute in the near-term is to help
us find real bugs in the app so that we get to something stable and
usable as fast as we can.
Thx Dan!
Mimi
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Open Source Applications Foundation "Design" mailing list
http://lists.osafoundation.org/mailman/listinfo/design
