On Sun, Oct 31, 2010 at 7:25 AM, Chani <chan...@gmail.com> wrote: > when you click the "new activity" button, you currently see about five > different plugins, plus a template (sooon to be many templates) and a clone > option. > > I watched a user trying the activity UI at opensuse, and he had no idea > what > option to choose. I realised that's quite understandable - how would he > know > that the default plugin is called "Desktop" and not "Grouping Desktop" or > "Grid Desktop"? the options are just plain overwhelming, and with templates > that's likely to get worse. > > so, how can we improve that dialog? I want it to suggest the best choice > for > newbies without overwhelming them, but still offer the alternatives that > they > can try out when they're ready. > > my first thought is, banish templates and plugins to their own submenus. > this > will probably help with the initial drowning-in-choices problem, but it's > not > enough on its own. > having the clone option and two submenus suggests choosing to clone - which > isn't half bad. I think that our default "desktop" plugin should be > promoted > up there too - it's one we know works, and is probably what the user wants. > and they can always change the plugin in settings anyways. > either that, or we create a default template, like the "default panel", and > promote that one to be in the root menu. > > actually, since they can change the plugin in settings, does it make > *sense* > to also offer that option at activity creation time? it's a nice shortcut > if > you have multiple screen and want them all to use a particular plugin. > other > than that, it's just one more choice to make when what you're likely > thinking > is "I need to send this document off to its own activity so I can deal with > it > later, who gives a fuck about widgets?" ;) > > so... what did I end up suggesting here? > -remove the choice of plugins, default to "desktop" > -put one "empty desktop" option in the root menu > -put templates in a sub-menu (if there's >1 of course) > and perhaps also: > -put one good template in the root menu. > > thoughts? :) > > What about having a preview of what you would get with each containment? Not a live preview, just an example screenshot designed specifically to highlight what is unique about each containment type. I know this wouldn't work as well for something like the grouping desktop, which just adds a new containment type to the existing desktop (which makes me wonder why it is a separate containment at all, but that is another issue). But for the main containment types it should provide some guidance to users.
An alternative (or supplement) would be a "Help Me Choose" wizard. This would have a screenshot or very short clip (like the instructional videos on userbase) along with a brief explanation about what the point of each containment is. This would slow down adding the first containment, but this would be opt-in (users would have to click a "Help me choose..." menu item) and should only need to be done a couple of times before the user gets a feel for the containments. These two ideas are not mutually exclusive, either. -Todd
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