[imp] removed contact menu entry

[Rich Lafferty]

On Wed, Jun 06, 2001 at 01:12:04PM -0400, Chuck Hagenbuch (chuck@horde.org) wrote:
> Quoting Rich Lafferty <rich@horde.org>:
> 
> > Redundancy is not undesirable in user interfaces. Count the number of
> > ways to say "go back one page" in Netscape, for instance, or the
> > number of ways to delete a file in Windows -- or, for that matter, the
> > number of ways to mark a message as "Deleted" in IMP's mailbox view.
> 
> I think it's undesireable in this particular case; it'd be like
> having two buttons in your web browser that meant "go back one
> page", except that they had different icons and one of them opened
> the page in a new window.

I've got two buttons in my web browser that mean "follow this link",
with different icons, one of which opens a page in a new window.  But
I think that part of the problem here is that for installs that only
use IMP and Turba, the user doesn't *need* to know that it's a
separate application. 

In fact, I can't think of any situation offhand in which one *would*
need the user to know that Turba is a separate application. I
understand the logic behind separating it from the point of view of
the programmer, but not from the point of view of the user. The user,
I think, wants his contacts list in IMP and in Kronolith and in Troll
and so on to be the same thing, but I don't think he cares that it's a
separate entity. The link at the bottom reflects how things have been
partitioned behind the curtain; the contacts action at the top
reflects how users have learned to conceptualize their mail
program, calendar program, or newsreader's features.

> Alright, how about this: we add a configuration option to IMP (and any app) 
> called $conf['menu']['apps'] (or something similar). It contains an array of 
> app names to include links to in the menubar.

That solves the problem of having the link in the menubar, but I think
there's a more fundamental design problem involved. What advantage
does knowing that Turba is a separate application -- as compared to
knowing that all Horde apps have the same interface to their contacts
list -- confer upon the user?

  -Rich

-- 
Rich Lafferty --------------+-----------------------------------------------
 Montreal, Quebec, Canada   |  "Do not dangle the mouse by the cord or
 http://www.lafferty.ca/    |   throw it at coworkers."  -- SGI Indy manual
rich@lafferty.ca -----------+-----------------------------------------------


>From chuck@horde.org Date: Wed,  6 Jun 2001 13:44:06 -0400
Return-Path: <chuck@horde.org>
Mailing-List: contact imp-help@lists.horde.org; run by ezmlm
Delivered-To: mailing list imp@lists.horde.org
Received: (qmail 13435 invoked from network); 6 Jun 2001 17:45:48 -0000
Received: from 208-59-250-206.c3-0.smr-ubr1.sbo-smr.ma.cable.rcn.com (HELO marina.horde.org) (208.59.250.206)
  by horde.org with SMTP; 6 Jun 2001 17:45:48 -0000
Received: by marina.horde.org (Postfix, from userid 33)
	id B00D339F6; Wed,  6 Jun 2001 13:44:06 -0400 (EDT)
Received: from 206.243.191.252 ( [206.243.191.252])
	as user chuck@localhost by marina.horde.org with HTTP;
	Wed,  6 Jun 2001 13:44:06 -0400
Message-ID: <991849446.3b1e6be66e2a0@marina.horde.org>
Date: Wed,  6 Jun 2001 13:44:06 -0400
From: Chuck Hagenbuch <chuck@horde.org>
To: imp@lists.horde.org
References: <991829986.3b1e1fe274fb2@linux.wg.de> <991838288.3b1e4050bfa70@marina.horde.org> <991836353.3b1e38c117573@192.168.1.10> <20010606111842.C31982@lafferty.ca> <991845990.3b1e5e66f1d45@marina.horde.org> <20010606130409.G31982@lafferty.ca> <991847524.3b1e64643a8b1@marina.horde.org> <20010606133127.H31982@lafferty.ca>
In-Reply-To: <20010606133127.H31982@lafferty.ca>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
User-Agent: Internet Messaging Program (IMP) 2.3.7-cvs
Subject: Re: [imp] removed contact menu entry

Quoting Rich Lafferty <rich@horde.org>:

> That solves the problem of having the link in the menubar, but I think
> there's a more fundamental design problem involved. What advantage
> does knowing that Turba is a separate application -- as compared to
> knowing that all Horde apps have the same interface to their contacts
> list -- confer upon the user?

With this solution, why does the user know that it's a seperate application?

-chuck

--
Charles Hagenbuch, <chuck@horde.org>
Black and white and grey, all the shades of truth.