[g-a-devel]Re: More on Keyboard moves in Panel

[Calum Benson <calum benson sun com>]

Glynn Foster wrote:

> > Hmm, that doesn't sound like what we had in mind at all, let me re-read
> > the spec and see what I really meant to write!
> 
> I thought we were using the arrow keys for this?

We are, but Tab was supposed to work too.  I see what's happened
though.... the use of Tab to move something from one panel to another
is, according to the spec, only supposed to work in Move mode.  

However, Padraig and I agreed to deviate from the spec a bit on Friday,
so that you didn't have to be in Move mode to move objects around within
a panel.  That is, you can now push/flip/free move panel objects around
just by giving them focus and using modifier+arrowkeys, whereas in the
spec you had to give them focus, select Move mode from context menu
(shift+f10), move them with modifier+arrowkeys, then hit Enter/Space to
exit Move mode again.

The move-between-panels functionality sounds like something we might
need to keep within Move mode, though, because in normal use Tab should
just move the focus along the panel, as you would expect.  It would be a
bit odd if that was the *only* thing you could do from the keyboard
within Move mode, though... so I guess the options are:

1) put all the keyboard push/flip/free movement back into Move mode as
well, forcing the user to always go into Move mode... could we easily
add a keyboard shortcut for the Move menu item (Ctrl+M or something)
that would appear on all panel objects' menus, or would that mean
modifying all the applets etc. by hand?  The shortcut would make things
slightly more usable, but it would mean applets couldn't use Ctrl+M for
their own purposes.

2) always allow keyboard push/flip/free movement whether you're in Move
mode or not, but only allow between-panel keyboard movement while you're
actually in Move mode

3) keep it the way Padraig currently has it, but pick a key other than
Tab to move stuff between panels when you're not in Move mode

Anyone have any preferences or other alternatives?  (1) would be the
most consistent solution, as it keeps all the move functionality in the
one place, but as Padraig said to me earlier it's a bit of an effort
when all you want to do is move one of your icons half an inch to the
left.  So I'm tempted to favour (2), even though it obscures the
between-panel functionality-- people would probably only find it if they
read the docs. (3) would mean picking an arbitrary key that isn't
normally used for navigation (we're currently using up all the others),
which doesn't sound too clever, and it would also mean that applets
couldn't use that key for their own internal navigation.

Cheeri,
Calum.

-- 
CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer       Sun Microsystems Ireland
mailto:calum benson ireland sun com    Desktop Engineering Group
http://www.sun.ie                      +353 1 819 9771

Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems