On 13 Mar 2006, at 21:34, David-John Burrowes wrote: > I'm sure Mac users have the same problem with "smart folders". And I > agree with most of what Frank says. > > This whole notion of being able to take a query and represent it as a > folder or other such collection is powerful, but it is very, very far > outside of the conceptual model that most people have of their > computing > environment. > > Except for keyword searches, most people find the notion of a query > very > challenging. To somehow "store" one is even harder. To then > represent it > as a folder just adds an obscuring layer on top of that challenging > abstraction. Even worse, of course, is the fact that most people > really > don't fully understand filesystems, and often are operating out of > habit > and faith there.
This is true, but in OSX and GNOME (and presumably Vista, when it arrives), "smart folders" don't exist in isolation. In OSX, some of the iLife apps have their own "smart folders" (or "smart playlists", in the case of iTunes), as does Mail.app. Likewise in GNOME, Evolution has had vFolders for years. These might be considered 'advanced' features (although they're not marketed as such), but having used those, a user does at least gain some basis for abstracting the idea into their file manager. > (on top of all this, I've never been highly clear what problems these > would actually solve for ordinary users :-) For the file manager case, I can at least see some /potential/ for the sort of "ordinary user" who dumps everything into their "My Documents" folder, and has no notion of subfolders-- but ironically, of course, they're probably also the least likely to discover and use the feature in the normal course of things. To the more sophisticated user who already has all their documents sorted into many subfolders of their own making, I'd agree the benefit seems a bit more marginal. Where implemented inside individual applications, though, I'd say they're a lot more useful... most iTunes users seem to understand and use the concept of smart playlists (partly because it cleverly comes with some pre-configured), smart folders are invaluable in iPhoto when you have thousands of photographs to wade through, and many Evolution users switched from other mail clients just to use vFolders. (Of course, our own dtmail had that feature too, before Evolution was even a twinkle in Helixcode/Ximian/Novell's eye...) Cheeri, Calum. > david > > > > On Fri, 2006-03-10 at 10:46, Calum Benson wrote: >> On 10 Mar 2006, at 18:12, Frank Ludolph wrote: >> >>> Thanks John. >>> >>> Note in the following that users are quite confused by MS's >>> "virtual folders". While naming is part of it, the user model is >>> very broken due to MS's abusing the basic folder metaphor. A folder >>> is a container. To users a "virtual folder" also seems to be a >>> container, so a document seems to be two places, the Documents >>> folder and the Documents virtual folder. It takes a lot of >>> explaining that a virtual folder isn't actually a container. Users >>> lock onto their understanding of "folder" since most are >>> uncomfortable with the meaning of "virtual" and how it applies to >>> folders. This just isn't part of a user's world knowledge. "Virtual >>> folders" will continue to cause lots of confusion until the >>> underlying metaphor is changed to something entirely different, >>> e.g. some sort of "list" - lists don't contain things, they refer >>> to things. >> >> Hmm. Wonder if Mac users have the same problem with "Smart >> Folders"? (IIRC, these are also available in GNOME 2.14 as "Search >> Folders", but possibly only if you have Beagle installed.) >> >> Cheeri, >> Calum. >> >> -- >> CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer Sun Microsystems Ireland >> mailto:calum.benson at sun.com Java Desktop System Team >> http://blogs.sun.com/calum +353 1 819 9771 >> >> Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun >> Microsystems >> >> > > _______________________________________________ > desktop-discuss mailing list > desktop-discuss at opensolaris.org -- CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer Sun Microsystems Ireland mailto:calum.benson at sun.com Java Desktop System Team http://blogs.sun.com/calum +353 1 819 9771 Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems
