Minutes of the Design Hangout: 2014-10-08

[Jan Holesovsky]

* Present: Cor, Heiko, Hillar, Jay, Kendy, Samuel, Steve
    + [I think Mirek joined later, but not 100% sure it was him :-)]
 
* Completed Action Items:
 
    + Kendy: Provide Jay with pointers to .ui for the sidebar
    + Samuel: Switch on the alternating lines in list boxes generally;
      and also check what the other platforms are doing (like, if this
      way of highlighting is known/standard there)
    + Jay: create bugs for the rest of new Color picker bugs in bugzilla,
      and ping Krisztian
    + Kendy: Create an Easy Hack to conform the sidebar icons size
      to the general icon size setting - https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=66876
    + Kendy: Check the how much info is in the redmine wiki
 
* Pending Action Items:
 
    + none

* Striped Rows (Samuel)
    + Seems to be generally a good idea for tables, makes it easier for
      the eye to follow the row
        + but not for simple lists
    + OSX: Finder and iTunes have striped Rows:
        + http://tinyurl.com/putu5ap http://tinyurl.com/p4czpdp
    + Windows: Seems to be not common
    + Linux: Not seen in Gnome, only KDE:
        + http://www.datamation.com/img/2008/07/kde-4.1-dolphin.jpg
    + Conclusion: Let's not enable by default everywhere, we should look
      for places where it could be enabled manually
AI  + Samuel: Create an easy hack - describe what tables should get
      this, and how to do that in the code.
 
* Redmine wiki (Kendy)
 
    + not backed up!!!
    + the info from there should be moved to the TDF wiki, and only
      pointers from redmine to TDF should stay
    + luckily not much there - any taker to transfer that, please?
AI  + Kendy: Find somebody to transfer that...

* 'Insert Table' button
 
    + Changed the Insert Table button to dropdown-only:
        + https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=84551
    + reason for the change
        + concern about the default action - the main functionality
          in the arrow, not so common func in the main button
    + Some QA people want this reverted
        + concern about buttons that can be used 3x ways (Cor)
          maybe we break consistency?  So if the decision is to
          change the behavior, it must be a normal button, not
          a split one
            + which is the case! (Kendy)
    + How to express positive feedback, actually? (Steve)
        + hard...
    + Need a measurable way... (Kendy)
        + hacked up counting of .uno: actions during user's work
          to have data
    + Comparative analysis
        + MS Word (2003 toolbar & 2007+ ribbon), WPS Writer
          (toolbar & ribbon), WordPerfect (toolbar), and Calligra
          Words (sidebar) all show it this way
        + iWork Pages has a toolbar drop down, but only allows
          selecting the table theme, as it automatically inserts
          a 4 column and 5 row table - http://youtu.be/1RyUYMhpXMw?t=12m16s
        + gdocs - no dialog to insert table at all, only choosing
          in the grid (from the menu, though)
    + Nice analysis:
        + http://user-prompt.com/de/libreoffice-user-research-results-vol-4/
          (see the part "Interaction")
    + Better description of the button needed, 'More...' seems not to be
      descriptive enough
        + 'More Options' is used in the sidebar with drop downs
          like bullets, underline, page size, etc
        + 'More...' is used in the style drop down, while other
          buttons have used 'Other...' (insert field)
        + or 'Custom...' (3d-settings toolbar's depth, fontwork
          toolbar's characer spacing) (Jay)
        + 'Insert Table...' maybe? (Kendy)
        + 'More Details...' ? (Kendy)
AI      + Jay: Pick something + see how we can make it more consistent
          overall.
    + Conclusion: Competitive analysis and
      http://user-prompt.com/de/libreoffice-user-research-results-vol-4/
      (see the part "Interaction") supports that for Table button, it
      is better to have the graphical selection as the default for
      the entire button, provided that we improve the wording of the
      "More..." button.  Nevertheless, we will measure that (will be
      possible shortly), and see how much is that used.
    + Update from the post-meeting chat: Re-measurement not necessary,
      the change is accepted, part of this was a misunderstanding.

* UI changes integrated the last week (Samuel):

    + discussed only the 'Insert table', we have run out of time
    + the following were integrated - we'll go through that the next
      time:
        + Changed the Insert Field button to dropdown-only:
          https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=84550
        + Styles dropdown
            + Previews the background color too now
            + Changes font color when it's too close to the background
              color
            + Flat menu button - just the triangle is shown, button
              on mouse-over
        + Styles+Formatting floating dialog removed, will now always
          open in the Sidebar (as the Gallery)

* Collecting the user information
 
    + we have only very old data so far; and no idea how reliable
    + prototype: http://cgit.freedesktop.org/libreoffice/core/commit/?id=35da89fa1428f5286304fc707252242554d49ea6

All the best,
Kendy