Fwd: Re: [imp] Attachment interface confusing to users

[Edward Glowacki]

On Mon, 2002-06-24 at 12:04, Chuck Hagenbuch wrote:
> I think this was meant for the list. For what it's worth, the context-
> specific help works perfectly for me in HEAD. In this very window that I'm 
> writing the message in, in fact. If it doesn't work for you, then you 
> probably have a bad language preference set.

Glad you forwarded it, hope Eric doesn't mind! =)

> ----- Forwarded message from eric.rostetter@physics.utexas.edu -----
>     Date: Sun, 23 Jun 2002 23:32:15 -0500
>     From: Eric Rostetter <eric.rostetter@physics.utexas.edu>
> Reply-To: Eric Rostetter <eric.rostetter@physics.utexas.edu>
>  Subject: Re: [imp] Attachment interface confusing to users
>       To: Chuck Hagenbuch <chuck@horde.org>
> 
> Quoting Chuck Hagenbuch <chuck@horde.org>:
> 
> > All of these, at a glance, rip out things that are essential (Expand 
> > Names), or that should be there (the help, which does indeed work fine), 
> 
> I agree with Chuck about not removing these things.  But I also noted that
> in my HEAD version help did not work "right."  However, it not working right
> just means it should be fixed, not removed.

Agreed, fixing is a correct answer, and the fact that it was broken did
heavily contribute to my wanting to remove them.  I guess the icons
*are* fairly unobtrusive, so leaving them in shouldn't be much of a
distraction to the interface.  Also, a brief glance at our server logs
does indicate that users use them as an entry point to the help system,
which definitely helps the argument for leaving them in... =) The
flipside is if help isn't accessed that much, then the extra step to get
to it might not be a problem.  

 
> > and most look a lot less intuitive to me than the current model. Just 
> > making things smaller isn't necessarily a good thing.
> 
> I think he had some good ideas, and it could lead to a longer discussion
> on things.  But I agree on not removing stuff, just rearranging stuff.

I'm certainly willing to try a few more designs (with the help and
expand-names command left in).  I'll see when I get some time, maybe I
can hack a functional version this time...

> I think we might benefit if enough people participate in this discussion.
> Previous discussions about this (in particular about the "attachments"
> button never went anywhere, and no one ever put any work into it.  
> I'm encouraged that someone actually spent time and effort in trying
> something new.  It might benefit us to follow this one for a while.

Certainly, the more people that give feedback about the designs (both
current and experimental), the better off the project is as a whole.  


> Again, I disagree with removing help/expandnames, but I'm not sure about
> the rest of the changes either.  But I really do think the "attachments"
> button is a real issue, and the fact that this has come up before makes
> me think changes should be considered...

Also consider that this problem report made it through our front line
customer support (the help desk) and on to me (system administrator). 
Now, keep in mind that the help desk deals with a lot more than just IMP
questions, so it's not at all surprising that they hadn't sent an
attachment with IMP before, but what's interesting is that the help desk
attendant was just as confused as the user that the attachment button
didn't work when they *did* finally try it...  To me, that's a clear
signal that the attachment button could use some changes.


-ED

-- 
Edward Glowacki             glowack2@msu.edu

"A wise craftsman never blames his tools."