[imp] migrating users from traditional to dynamic interface (message deletion)

[Vilius Šumskas]

> Zitat von Vilius ?umskas <vilius at lnk.lt>:
> 
> >> Zitat von Vilius ?umskas <vilius at lnk.lt>:
> >>
> >> >> Quoting Vilius ?umskas <vilius at lnk.lt>:
> >> >>
> >> >> > Hello,
> >> >> >
> >> >> >   I  had  a  chance  to  migrate  one  of my bigger installations from
> >> >> >   traditional  to  dynamic  interface  recently. And stumbled upon one
> >> >> >   major  problem.  Seems  like  a  fair  amount  of  users had used to
> >> >> >   traditional  IMP  interface  and the concept of "mailbox pages" that
> >> >> >   now  they make serious mistakes performing actions on "message
> list"
> >> >> >   in the dynamic view.
> >> >> >
> >> >> >   For  example,  they  used upper checkbox in traditional interface to
> >> >> >   mark  20  messages  (or whatever is configured as message number
> per
> >> >> >   page), and clicked Delete to delete all messages in the currect page.
> >> >> >   Of  course  in  dynamic  view this empties a whole mailbox.
> Moreover
> >> >> >   there  is  no confirmation  popup saying "Are you sure that
> >> you want to
> >> >> >   empty this folder?"
> >> >> >
> >> >> >   Can it be added?
> >> >>
> >> >> No.  Especially since the method used in dynamic view is the
> >> >> *expected* way that button should work.  Selecting all messages is
> NOT
> >> >> a destructive action in and of itself.  And whether users are
> >> >
> >> > Yes, but selecting all messages and hitting Delete is destructive. I
> >> > think there should be a confirmation if user selected all messages
> >> > which upper checkbox AND clicked Delete.
> >> >
> >> >> migrating from the traditional view is totally site-dependent.
> >> >>
> >> >> If you are truly worried about losing messages, you should enforce a
> >> >> Trash mailbox.
> >> >
> >> > Actually I did. But this didn't help, because user went to Trash
> >> > mailbox and just cleared the Trash too, because he didn't think that
> >> > Trash contained all the emails either. He just clicked select all
> >> > and Delete in the Trash thinking that he is deleting 20 messages.
> >>
> >> Then the server should be configured to a delayed expunge to protect
> >> users from potential data loss.
> >>
> >> But I also don't think the problem you describe warrants a check on
> >> the code side. What you describe is a transient problem that won't
> >> stay for long time as users get adapted to the new interface. While
> >> the protection you ask for would be useful at first it would become
> >> annoying shortly after.
> >
> > I don't think that it would be annoying. What I'm asking is that
> > this confirmation popup would be shown only when *all* messages in
> > current mailbox are selected *and* the Delete is clicked.  We show
> > such protection when emptying mailbox from the context menu on the
> > folder on the left anyway. And at least to me this would be more
> > consistent behaviour, because selecting all messages and deleting
> > equals emptying the folder.
> 
> The difference is that you select a single entry in a context menu and
> that could also happen by chance. You need the additional protection
> there.
> 
> When selecting all messages and subsequently hitting the "Delete"
> action it is very unlikely that this happens by chance.
> 
> But I thought about the problem again yesterday and think there might
> be alternatives.
> 
> The problem you describe obviously originates from the fact that it
> was unclear to the user that she selected *all* messages. Looking at
> our UI I must admit that this is hard to see. We display the note "358
> messages selected" but it is a faint gray and may be difficult to see.
> I wonder if we could make this more obvious. Do people think that this
> might be an option?

It would not work, if the user has disabled preview pane.

But maybe something could be done on the message count in the header on the right? For example move it to the left and show only total count and selected count near the mailbox name. "From" and "to" numbers not really needed anyway. For example "Inbox (Total messages: 553, selected: 125)".

-- 
   Vilius