On 6/14/10 10:01 AM, Donald Woods wrote:
#1-3 are good usability improvements.
Can we use Dojo for #4-6? Seems hover help would be the best option, as
adding an example beside/below every field could require a lot of screen
area and doesn't cover the cases for links (like
Start/Stop/Restart/Delete....). Also, the portlet help page should
include the same text as the hoover help (which should be the same
resource strings), plus additional help text if needed.
#7 requires us to stop reorganizing the User Docs and would mean we
couldn't rename pages. If we go this route, we should include a hidden
comment on each doc page with a reference back to the portlet that has a
link to it, so we know not to rename the page unless the portlet link is
updated too.
Connecting the documentation and console will be expensive to maintain.
As a general principle, I would suggest carefully weighing the
'opportunity cost' of adding new features to the server that require
on-going maintenance. Each added feature that requires on-going
maintenance takes time away from other potentially more important work.
Over time as more 'on-going' maintenance requirements accumulate, the
development team spends more and more effort to just tending to the
maintenance; less time is spent on innovation and keeping current with
technology trends.
Bill
