[dev] Interface design Horde 4.1/5.0

[Henning Retzgen]

I very much like the new design because it is a return to the "no frills"
interface horde used to have.
The new interface will improve the user experience quite a bit. While I don´t
think that the improvement lies in measurable times, most programmers tend to
forget that most user satisfaction does not come from features or measurable
time benefits but from the "feeling" of a software (W7 UI is faster than Vistas?
Only by something like tenth of a second per click which has absolutely no
impact on productivity but it feels faster so W7 is normally perceived as vastly
faster than Vista). So the new UI should bring the idea across that you are
using a coherent software product and not a conglomarate of different programs
patched together (as it is now with horde 4 IMHO). 
I also think that the first impression of a software accounts for a lot. And the
first thing you see is the UI no matter wether it is only a fascade for a buggy
program or not. A lot of decisions in businesses are made not by the IT
department so that the outward appearance of a program very often is the
deciding element wether a software is implemented.

I was thinking that maybe extending the "hover" elements might unclutter the
layout (I do realize that this is slightly at odds with my prior "no frills"
idea but nonetheless I think it might make sense). So for example hovering the
mouse pointer over a date in the calender will show detailed information and a
button to contact the attendees. Hovering over a name in an email will bring up
the entry in the adressbook and a "new email" button. Hovering over the
mailcount in the Top Bar brings up a short list of the email titles. The list
can be continued almost endlessly.

Regards

Henning