[Libreoffice-ux-advise] [GSoC] Use Widget Layout for the Start Center

[Mirek M.]

Hi,

On Wed, Aug 14, 2013 at 11:00 AM, Jean-Baptiste Faure <
jbf.faure at sud-ouest.org> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Le 14/08/2013 08:51, Mirek M. a écrit :
> > On Tue, Aug 13, 2013 at 11:10 PM, Jean-Baptiste Faure
> > <jbf.faure at sud-ouest.org <mailto:jbf.faure at sud-ouest.org>> wrote:
> >
> >     Hi Krisztian,
> >
> >     Le 24/07/2013 18:16, Krisztian Pinter a écrit :
> >     > Hi all!
> >     >
> >     > I'm working on this GSoC
> >     > project:
> >
> https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Development/Gsoc/Ideas#Use_Widget_Layout_for_the_Start_Center
> >
> >     I just tried the first implementation of the new startcenter in the
> >     master. It is interesting to view the recent documents but there is a
> >     problem in the actual implementation in which it is impossible to see
> >     the entire name of the file. Do you plan to offer different views of
> the
> >     list, like icons, detailed list and compact list?
> >
> >
> > My opinion on the matter:
> > It'd be good to keep the number of views simple.
> > A detailed list makes sense, but I don't see much of a point in an icon
> > list (thumbnails are much more informational, icons just show the file
> > type and are completely useless when you're not on the "All" tab).
>
> I disagree, icons are useful even when you are not on the "All" tab to
> distinguish between ODF, MSO files or other document formats.
>

AFAIK, we don't have separate icons for the various file formats right now.
However, if easy separation between these formats was something we needed,
we could simply add labels to our thumbnails instead.
This would add clutter, though, so perhaps presenting this information as a
file extension might be better.


> I think thumbnails are informational if you have the possibility to zoom
> temporary on a particular thumbnail to see a more detailed view. In
> other cases I prefer icons and filenames.
>

You should use list view, then. :)

>
> > I'm not in favor of a compact list either -- if you need a list, use the
> > detailed list view, if you need to browse quickly, use the thumbnail
> > view. I realize that the compact view is much more compact, but it
> > doesn't seem worth the work and the UI overhead.
>
> I agree, it was just an example of the different possible views.
>
> >
> >
> >     In the mockup (here:
> >     https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Design/Whiteboards/Start_Center)
> the
> >     filenames follow the old ms-dos 8 digit rule; am I wrong if I assume
> >     that, today, nobody still uses that rule in the real life ? ;-)
> >
> >
> > Sorry, I left out the handling of long names from the proposal.
> > Given that Gnome Documents [1] uses the same layout, how about adopting
> > their way -- limiting the filename to two rows, and if it doesn't fit,
> > cutting it off about 8 characters from the end of the word, if I'm not
> > mistaken. You can ask Jon McCann or Jakub Steiner about the specifics,
> > if you'd like.
>
> Why only 2 rows? If the files systems allow to have long filenames,
> applications should not decide to nullify this functionality.
>

I was basing the design on that of Gnome Documents, where the reasoning is
to keep a nice layout going.
iWork and Google Drive go even further and allow one line for filenames.

Perhaps you're right, though -- maybe we should leave the file names up to
the user. Still, I'd be more comfortable limiting the name to at least 3 or
4 rows, to make sure a single file doesn't completely break the layout.

>
> In a detailed list view, each column should be adjustable. Indeed it is
> very common to have filenames longer than 30 characters and
> distinguishable only by their last characters (for example when using
> suffixes like _v01, _v02, etc.).
>

Yes -- that's why the cuttoff should leave about 8 characters at the end of
the word. (Gnome's example is "Filetype icon is really a severe
an..xception".)

>
> As the new StartCenter becomes a kind of document manager, it should be
> very useful if it allowed to right-click on a document to display some
> useful informations like size, pathname, last modified date, etc.
>

> From an accessibility point of view, tooltips should be displayed in the
> thumbnails view.
>

Tooltips with what information?
(Tooltips should show the full title if it's cut off.)

>
> Another function which could be very useful is "remove all not existent
> local files from the recent files list".
>

This should be done automatically, not with a button.
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