Quentin, this is fabulous input. Thank you so much for taking the trouble to document all this. You are absolutely right, its very difficult for a seasoned dev to look at LiveCode with sufficiently innocent eyes.
Keep it coming! and I'll make sure Ali sees this too :) Regards, Heather Heather Laine Customer Services Manager LiveCode Ltd www.livecode.com > On 6 May 2016, at 11:02, Quentin Long <cub...@aol.com> wrote: > > Downloaded the stable 8.0 release, opened it up. What the heck, figured I'd > try to work thru the Interactive Welcome. Noted some aspects of the IW that > might be problematic for LC newbies. Since the IW is presumably supposed to > be LC putting its best foot forward, and even minor issues could discourage a > novice from exploring the wonders of LC, I'll list some issues I encountered, > in the order encountered… > > ========== > > First issue: "Set the 'Background Fill' color of the stack to white" > Problem, from a newbie's PoV: Wait a second. That Inspector-thingie looked > different for a fraction of a second before it settled down to that tower of > "fill"s and "color"s. LiveCode does that sort of thing automatically? > > Possible fix: Add a little something to the 'narration box'. You've told the > user about the icons along the top edge of the Inspector window, and what > those icons are for; the 'little something' called for here is in the > neighborhood of "Right now, we're going to show you the 'Colors' category of > settings." In other words, an explicit acknowledgement that LC is going to > futz with the Inspector, so don't panic. > > ---------- > > Problem, from a newbie's PoV: Okay, *how* do I set the BF color to white? The > blue box is pointing right at "Background Fill" in the window that popped up > when I clicked on the "Inspector" icon, which is good, cuz there's a *lot* of > other "fill"s and "color"s to confuse the issue. So, okay, "Background Fill", > but I don't see anything that looks like "click *here* to set a color". > There's a white box with a red slashmark in it, but a red slashmark means > "don't do this", so I guess I don't want to click that box. There's also a > grey-outlined box whose interior is filled with the same color as the > background of the Inspector window; greyed-out means "not available", right? > So… I'm stuck. > > Fortunately, I (Cubist) an *not* an LC newbie. I have a fair amount of > previous experience with MetaCard, Revolution, and LiveCode. So *I* knew to > click on that red-slashed box in order to set the Background Fill color. Am > unsure whether someone who genuinely is new to LC would think to do that. > > Possible fix: Steal the 'red oval' from Apple Guide. Put said oval around the > box you're supposed to click on… and maybe said oval should fade in and out, > 'pulsing' to (1) draw attention to itself and (2) provide some indication > that it's *not* actually a standard part of the LC interface. > > ========== > > Second issue: "Set the 'Text Size' of the stack to 18…" > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Hold it, where did *that* come from? > Does LiveCode automatically force you to set text size immediately after you > set background color? I'm not sure I want to deal with LC if *it*'s gonna > decide for *itself* what settings I'm going to tweak. > > Possible fix: Add a new 'narration box', immediately after the user succeeds > in setting the background color to 'white'. This new narration box should say > something like, "You've just set the stack's background color to white. Cool! > For your next trick, you're going to tweak the size of the text that appears > in this stack." > Next narration box: "Click on the Inspector icon again, to bring the > Inspector back." > When the Inspector is on the screen, red-oval the Text icon, and a fresh > narration box: "Click on the Text icon to show you LC's text-formatting > options." > When the Inspector is displaying its Text options, red-oval the TextSize > input box, and show the existing "Set the 'Text Size'…" character string in a > fresh narration box. > > ========== > > Third issue: The stack turned green when I dragged that > title-bar/widget/whatzit onto the stack. > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Wait, what's up with *that*? *I* > didn't tell it to change any colors of anything! Is this something LC does > just because, or is it a bug, or what? > > Possible fix: Maybe the narration box which directs the user to drag the > widget onto the stack should include a note about "Oh, and the stack will > turn green for a little bit when you drag the widget onto it. LC does this > because [insert reason here]." > > ========== > > Fourth issue: "Set the 'Title of the header bar widget to 'BMI Calculator', > and press <return>." > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Will a newbie realize that you're > asking them to press the return key, and not asking them to *type* > left-angle-bracket, "r", "e", "t", "u", "r", "n", right=angle-bracket? > > Possible fix: Change it to "press the return key"or "type the return key". > > ---------- > > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Okay, I typed "BMI Calculator" in > that text box. I hit the return key… and the "BMI Calculator" string suddenly > scrolled up to *almost* completely outside its text box. That's kind of ugly > and awkward. > > I (Cubist) know that what's going on here is that the textbox in question > accepts multi-line input. I am not at all sure that it *should* accept > multi-line input, because, well, that textbox is supposed to be for letting > the user supply a *title*, and since when does *anything* have a title that's > 2+ lines of text? > > Apart from that, the narration box clearly assumed that hitting the return > key would tell LC, "here's what I want the title of that widget to be", and > THAT ISN'T WHAT HAPPENED. Hitting *tab* is what told LC "here's what I want > the title of that widget to be". > > Possible fix: Edit the text in the narration box. Instead of "press > <return>", say "press <tab>" (or whatever you do if you choose to address the > "whaddayamean, 'return'? issue noted above). Or, since a *later* narration > box explains about the sweet "ctrl-return" trick for getting out of a textbox > that accepts multi-line input, maybe move that explanation to *this* > narration box, because the user encounters *this* narration box first? > > Other possible fix: Change the offending textbox so that pressing <return> > does what the narration-box text assumes it should do—that is, make the > 'title' textbox only accept single-line input. > > ========== > > Fifth issue: "Change the label of the header widget action…" > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Uh… how do I do that? It's not > immediately obvious to me. > > Seasoned LC hands, or seasoned programmers in general, probably won't have > any trouble here. But will newbies have a clue? > > Possible fix: Add a note to the narration box, something in the general > neighborhood of "Click on the label itself (the text that says 'Add', in this > case), and then start typing the new label." > > ========== > > Sixth issue: "Create a navigation bar widget…" > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: It turned green again!? What's going > on here? > > Possible fix: Add a note to the text in the narration box. "As with the > header widget, LC will make the stack turn green for a moment, because of > [insert reason here]." > > ========== > > Seventh issue: "Each line of the 'Navigation Data' has two icons… select the > 'cog' icon." > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: 'Cog' icon? *What* 'cog' icon!? I > don't see any 'çog' icon here! I don't even see any icons whose name *starts > with* 'C'! > > Possible fix: Make the vertical scrollbar *much* more obvious. As it stands, > that scrollbar is mightily easy to overlook. > > ========== > > Eighth issue: "Create a rounded rectangle graphic." > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Um. I clicked on that one little > icon, and nothing happened. > > Possible fix: Edit the text of the narration box. You've already said "create > X by dragging it onto the stack" in an earlier narration box, so you can say > that here, too. > > ---------- > > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Once again, the stack turns green > when I drag something onto it. At this point, the newbie may be getting the > idea that this is standard LC behavior. Then again, the newbie may also be > thinking "this is the last straw. goodbye, LiveCode!" > > Possible fix: Make a note of the "green stack" behavior in the text of the > narration box. > > ========== > > Ninth issue: "Set the 'Background Fill' color of the graphic to '0,128,255'." > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Wait, what's that—oh. Is that the > Inspector again? I guess… but what do I do with it? > > The problem here is that the narration box didn't show up immediately. It did > show up after I moved the Inspector window a little, manually. Not sure > what's going on here—did I just see a genuine bug in the Interactive Welcome > tutorial, or did I see a transient glitch in my system? > > Possible fix: Make sure the narration box is thrown onto the screen *after* > the Inspector window, I guess..? > > ---------- > > Problem, from a newbie's point of view: Okay, I clicked on that red-slash box > to bring up the color-selection doohickie. But I don't see any way to tell > the machine that I want the color "0,128,255"! > > The question is, does the newbie realize that what they've gotta do here is, > first, click on the "Color Sliders"icon in the 'Colors' window, and second, > select 'RBG sliders' from that popup menu? > > ========== > > Enough. There's definitely more, but this email is long enough as it stands. > I think everything I've noted could be summarized as "the guys what created > the Interactive Welcome need a more-realistic notion of the level of > background info/expertise a LiveCode newbie is likely to have". I am, of > course, assuming that the intended audience for the Interactive Welcome is > *supposed* to be people with essentially zero LiveCode expertise, because > honestly, how many people who *aren't* LC newbies are likely to look at the > Interactive Welcome? > > > "Bewitched" + "Charlie's Angels" - Charlie = "At Arm's Length" > > Read the webcomic at [ http://www.atarmslength.net ]! > > If you like "At Arm's Length", support it at [ > http://www.patreon.com/DarkwingDude ]. > > _______________________________________________ > use-livecode mailing list > use-livecode@lists.runrev.com > Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription > preferences: > http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode _______________________________________________ use-livecode mailing list use-livecode@lists.runrev.com Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-livecode
