Dave Minor wrote: > Chris Rijk wrote: > > *) For the graphical user interface to the > interactive install, I > > would suggest something like this: have a window > with a set of > > coloured and labeled tabs on the left. The > colouring would be based on > > whether information is required (coloured red say), > whether changes > > may be required (coloured orange), and whether > they're okay (coloured > > green). The bottom left tab would essentially be > "start install". Each > > tab would be a stage in the install. This would be > in addition to > > "next" and "previous" buttons in the main window. > > > > The reason for this being that if *all* you get is > next and previous > > you can't tell how many stages you have to go > through to get to the > > end. With the buttons, advanced users can also take > short cuts through > > the installer in a simple way. > > > > My UI designer will probably have some interesting > reactions to the > specific suggestions ;-), but yes, your main point > that wizards which > don't tell you where you are in the process, and > don't provide ways to > move around more gracefully than pressing the back > button 20 times, are > unfriendly is a good one. We'll try not to make that > mistake.
I'm the aforementioned UI designer, and I'm mostly just lurking on this thread. But seeing my "name" here urges me to leap into the discussion. :-) I completely agree that wizards with 20 buttons are unpleasant. Wizards which give you no clue whether there is one or 50 remaining steps are agony. As Dave says, we very much want to avoid both. Personally, I'd like to see the mainline installer for new folks be something like "Hi. Welcome to the Solaris installer. Press (OK) to install everything on your system (oh, and press (this) if you want advanced settings)". Which is to say, I'd like to strive for a "Just give me something workable with one button click" path and an "I'm an expert, let me control everything" path. Reality will probably not allow something quite that simplistic, but it seems like a good ideal to strive for. One thing to note about wizards. These often come from two forces. On the development side, they often come from a feeling that the user must provide a bunch of information before some action can be done. So the developer interrogates the user to get that info (this is, indirectly, what often leaves people feeling like victims when they use wizards. They're emphatically not in control of their destiny). On the end user side, most people feel intimidated when presented with a screen full of fields and buttons. Dividing the information gathering into separate wizard pages reduces feelings of overload and allows a user to focus on one question at a time (this can provide a better experience than asking for everything at once). For someone that truly wants to have very fine control over the install process, I'm not sure a wizard interface to do this is right. The user doesn't need to be "protected" from all the information. So, I'd anticipate that on an expert path through the installation experience, it will seem less like a wizard (with a zillion different pages to step through). Maybe my attitude might be phrased as something like: If you want it easy, we'll make it sweet and simple for you. But, if you want detailed control we're not going to put a fake sugar coating on the control you've asked for. david This message posted from opensolaris.org
