John L. Clark wrote: > After using the XMLmind XML Editor (XXE) V2.10 for a little while now, I > have some initial user-interface feedback. This does not come from a > testing process, but rather from my personal experience.
First of all, many thanks for your feedback. It is very hard to design a GUI which pleases everyone. A GUI design is a compromise. In my answer, I'll just try to explain why V2.10 is at the same time more powerful, more consistent and easier to use than V2.9. > I like the allowance for two different panes for tools at the same time, > but what was the motivation for placing the tabs to the right of the > panes, instead of along the top or the bottom (I would have preferred > the top)? By placing them along the side, I think XXE creates > unnecessary empty space along the side that could be used for displaying > attribute values or other lengthy horizontal information within the tool > itself. Vertical space on a computer screen is a much scarcer resource than Horizontal space. > Further, it is not entirely comfortable or natural (in my locale, at least) > to read the labels on these tabs as currently laid out > down the side of the tool display. You'll very quickly stop reading these labels. > In XXE V2.9p1, when editing attributes one could tab directly from the > attribute name field to its value field. In V2.10, pressing tab changes > the focus to the delete attribute button first, which I think is less > useful. I think it would be good to have exactly the same tab order for > this tool as was present in V2.9p1. The sequence is now (excerpt of "Being productive with XXE" -- http://www.xmlmind.com/xmleditor/_distrib/doc/user/userguide4.html#id.s4): --- 1. Type the name of the attribute in the name field (first field of the form). 2. Press Enter to move to the value field (second field of the form). 3. Type the value of the attribute in the value field. 4. Press Enter to commit the change and to give the keyboard focus back to the document view. Both the name and value fields support auto-completion. However auto-completion in the value field only works for attributes having the following types: any enumerated type, ID, IDREF, IDREFS. This auto-completion feature can be configured using the Options dialog box, Edit section. --- Note that the current tab order is now the *natural* tab order of any form (left to right, then top to bottom). > Perhaps to save space to allow for the presence of two tools, some > useful labels are notably absent in V2.10. Yes. XXE is designed to be usable on a 800x600 screen. > In XXE V2.9p1, there were labels such as "Attribute:" and "Value:" on the > attribute editing tool > that helped identify the various fields. These are no longer present in > V2.10, and I think their absence makes the tool less intuitive. XXE is definitely not intuitive to use. (Photoshop, The Gimp, Emacs, vi are also not intuitive to use. Not to compare XXE with these giants.) > Further, there were labels on the buttons in the edit tool that are no > longer present. The absence of labels on Insert Before/Into/After, Replace, Convert buttons is consistent with the absence of labels on Paste Before/To/After, Split, Join buttons. > If space is indeed an issue, would it be possible to > include these labels conditionally if the given tool is the only tool > displayed in the tools panel? Once again, users very quickly stop looking at such labels. > I think it is very nice that XXE highlights the first element matching > the given prefix in the edit tool, but I have a suggestion for an > enhancement. It would be useful if a user could visually distinguish > between the case of a fully-identifying prefix and one that remains > ambiguous. For example, I think it would be useful to highlight all of > the elements which match the given prefix; thus, when that list is > reduced to one element, the user knows that a space-completion will give > him or her exactly the highlighted element. Consider the current case > (in V2.10) of typing "p" in the (unmarked) element name field when > working with a DocBook document. The "para" entry will be highlighted, > but other elements are possible depending on a more specific prefix. A > prefix of "pa" would be needed to uniquely obtain a para element. The > user has to examine the prefixes of the elements to see if what he or > she has entered is sufficient to identify a single element type. I > think it would be fairly simple for the XXE user interface to aid the > user in this situation. We find that autocompletion in V2.10 works as expected and is pretty nice to use. We do not intend to improve it before a long time due to the enormous amount of work we still need to do. May be the (very intrusive) option "Append mode: Automatic" (Option, Edit section) would help in such a case. See http://www.xmlmind.com/xmleditor/_distrib/doc/help/ar01s06s01.html#editOptions2 Personally, I don't use it but many people seem to like it. We find that autocompletion in V2.10 works as expected and is pretty nice to use. We don't not intend to improve it before a long time due to the enormous amount of work we still need to do. May be the (very intrusive) option "Append mode: Automatic" (Option, Edit section) would help in such a case. See http://www.xmlmind.com/xmleditor/_distrib/doc/help/ar01s06s01.html#editOptions2 Personally, I don't use it but many people seem to like it. --- PS: You didn't like V2.10 but I'm pretty sure you'll like the enhancements of V2.11 (may be it'll be named V2.10p1).
