Re: [Evolution-hackers] Calendars and Tasks integration

[Anna Marie Dirks <anna ximian com>]

Il lun, 2003-08-18 alle 15:12, Ettore Perazzoli ha scritto:
> Yes, but that would cause the view to have two search bars (instead of
> one), which sounds overkill.  

I am advocating a label + option menu for the "filter bar" thingy I
described... not a full search bar by any stretch of the imagination.
Are two widgets (label + option menu) really overkill? A label + option
menu doesn't seem much more complex than a toolbar button at all. 

> Also, how do you make the user select the
> set of task "folders" to display?

I am really not sure that I understand your question. Are you asking
how, in a filter bar, you'd pick a set of folders? Or are you asking
which folders would appear in the filter bar, period? I'll assume the
former..

I was imagining that we'd just list each task folder in the option menu,
and the user can either select one of those, or select "all", or select
"Due Today". I guess if you wanted to get really fancy, you could add an
"Other..." choice to the menu which gives you an "advanced search" type
dialog from which you pick which tasks folders you want to display. But
I bet you that the vast majority of the time, people will only want to
see what's due today, or what is in a given task folder (or, all
folders). 

> In the new UI you can see calendar items from multiple sources at the
> same time, it makes sense that you can do the same thing with tasks.  I
> don't see an easy way to do that with a search bar though.

Well, if we went this route, then the summary of tasks in the calendar
would be just that-- a summary. I don't necessarily think that we'd want
or need to cram all of the same information/options into that summary as
into the tasks component (or for that matter, into the calendar
component). 

Maybe the problem is that I don't have the same picture of usage cases
as you do. The uses I've been thinking of for the tasks summary in the
calendar are along the lines of: 

1. I know that Tuesday is going to be an overloaded day for me, so I
want to check what stuff I'm supposed to do on Tuesday, including
appointments, meetings, and tasks. 

2. I am trying to plan my vacation, and I'm looking at my calendar to
see how many days I have left to make all my preparations before I have
to leave. 

3. I want to be prepared for the next Evo team meeting, so I'm trying to
figure out what designs I'm supposed to have prepared by that time. 

...

Are there other use cases that you are thinking of? Can you explain
them? That would help a lot.

On a different note, if you want to test the "toolbar button which
switches views" idea, make me a prototype (or give me a due date), and
I'll run it through the usability lab here. (Whatever idea we
tentatively decide on, we should try it on users in a controlled
environment so we can see how it works for them, no?)

Anna

-- 
Anna Marie Dirks <anna ximian com>