On Fri, Mar 24, 2006, Mikael Byström said: >Andy Fragen said: > >>I'm not really sure why a smart folder, which should have a different >>icon, need be any different than a regular folder in function. In other >>words, double click it and it opens in another window. Is that somehow >>not similar to incorporating smart folders into the RMB? > >Not necessarily. Things could be made more useful. For starters can smart >folders not be something more than "saved self-updating user settable >searches"?
They could be anything that's possible via code. ;-) But, I think that the 'usual' expectation is that smart folders are continually updated searches. >Smart folders would need to be in a different *default* place not to >confuse some people, not necessarily newcomers. >The confusion would be over whether what to expect to find in these >folders. A certain amount of people would - even if they set them up >themselves - expect that things they'd seen there would always be there, >even if the settings didn't support it. Because that is how people expect >folders to work. Also, most likely people would have a few to many 'smart >folders' and the folder listing would grow with these in addition and >move the "real" folders further down (if smart folders defaulted in the >upper region). Why couldn't smart folders simply integrate with real folders and be alpha sorted? Then all they really need is a different icon so the user has some indication that they're different. I also see some sort of plus/ minus/gear menu at the bottom of the folder panel. >One example that the GUI can confuse, also myself, because of reasonable >expectations on the GUI and what is shown, is that I had initial problems >the first weeks of use (in 2003 with v. 3) with having no indication of >when I had "Show Only Unread" active and thought for days that the >messages disappeared. This is not a unique experience. This bit a lot of people. >As another example I have mentioned the fact that the search dialog >doesn't indicate what kind of "words" that are not possible to find in >the index, something that would still confuse myself had I not been on >this list. I know many are not confused being unaware of the limitations >and when they come into play to affect the results they see (Note that >I'm not saying that searches have a big problem. It only affect certain >searches, not all, but the search dialog doesn't indicate the limitations >with indexed searching) Agreed. >One elegant solution would probably be a search tab, that would contain >user saved searches as well as the Recent Mail Folder (user tweakable I >imagine and with the same shortcut as usual). > From there the user could drag the virtual smart folders to the regular >folder listing, perhaps only as aliases. So having the Recent Messages >and other 'smart' folders should be able to put in the folder view, but I >think it's vital that this placement *isn't the default*. That's an interesting idea. >"Tabs" do have momentum to a much larger degree than 'smart folders' and >would keep as a *default* the 'virtual folders' (built-in and user- >definable) *separate* from the actual email message catalog, which the >browser is now displaying. I agree that tabs do have a certain amount of momentum and I believe that if they were implemented and the RMW was a constant tab presence more people would likely use it. >Don't you people that use the RMW and think it should be in the folder >view also think that search result windows in separate windows is an >abomination too? I think it would be neat and useful to store searches of >all kinds under a specific tab, rather than all over the place. It's a >more organized solution. Personally I don't suffer much having search >results windows all over the place though. > >Another solution would be folding the smart folders, like in the Finder >list view, but I think that's not as good solution. I'm not getting into >why here. Not sure what you mean by folding, nor why it's not a good solution. Since this discussion is theoretical we should have the benefit of what we think is good as well as what we think is bad. >I'm sure, if the usability goals can be defined of what users need and if >CTM agrees those features should be implemented at some point, that even >better solutions can be found. Agreed. > I don't think Apples iApp solutions (in >the interface & functionality areas discussed) are totally on the spot >nor are they unique and seldom firsts too. They do give user expectations >though, but even if the workings of specific features and details are >used in another developed app, it's not necessarily wrong to further >improve things. If nothing else, to avoid getting sued on copyright >infringement. I'm not sure there's any copyright infringement as most of these interfaces have been put into many other programs, but doing so might necessitate rewriting PM in Cocoa to take full advantage of these methods. -- Andy Fragen
