Re: [Evolution-hackers] Re: Evolution Context Menus (status report)

[Benjamin Kahn <xkahn ximian com>]

Hey Christine,
	Thanks for the comments!  I've replied inline.  The version you're
looking at is somewhat old -- a first draft.  I'll post the latest draft
to the blog tonight.

On Fri, 2005-01-07 at 17:32 -0500, Christine McLellan wrote:
> Ben -- I think there is good work here but I think there are some
> changes needed.  I have a lot of comments below.  I'd also like to
> compare the new Mailer menus to the other Component menus since some
> items might make more sense in context of Calendar and Contacts. Here
> is my detailed feedback on the proposal.  

	Yep.  I'll post the other components soon.  Sorry for the delay there.

> A) Main menu comments: 
> 
>     a) "Tools" should be before "Window" for consistency with other
> Apps
>     b) Menu should be "Window" not "Windows"

	Window has now been removed entirely since it would involve too much
new code to track all the Evolution windows.  (Says fejj, who probably
should know.)  New Window has been moved back to File, and the "Window"
or "Windows" menu is gone.  

> B) File Menu 
> 
>         a) PLEASE bring back File New > (cascade)

	This turned out to be almost impossible to remove from Evolution.  So
even though I disagree that it's needed, it's going back.   :^)

> 3) Edit Menu 
> 
>     a) where are Cut and Paste if I have a message in the list window
> selected?

	Cut and Paste are no longer around.  Copy copies message text only and
doesn't work on messages themselves.  You can move, copy, and delete
messages (not to mention drag and drop) as you always could.  The
current Evolution menus change their behavior depending on which widget
is selected.  For example, "Cut" simply copies the selection and
unselects everything if the message is focused.

>     b) Preferences
>         As I brought up to Ben on IRC.  Assuming that Edit Preferences
>         is a wholesale moving of Tools Settings, this is confusing
>         because it is now "the place to go to create a New mail
>         account".  I agree everything in the Tools Settings dialogs
>         EXCEPT managing accounts are really preferences and as such
>         make total sense under Edit Preferences.
>           
>         If we want to use Edit Preferences in a sensible way, then
>         part of the redesign should including fixing the Settings
>         dialogs to separate Accounts set up from this.  And then we
>         could have a new "Managing Accounts" item under either the
>         File or Tools menu - not sure where the HIG puts "meta
>         settings" but I could see either File or Tools. 

	I actually agree that Accounts should be separated out, although I'm
not sure this can be done in time, or if it would a UI change or a code
change.  (Seems a lot like both to me...  And a large change at that.)  

I would put Accounts under Edit.  (Edit -> Accounts)  But I also fail to
see how Tools -> Settings is better than Edit -> Preferences when
looking to set up an account.  That's why Evolution has wizards when you
run it the first time -- to stop people from hunting for this stuff.

>     c) Select All/Deselect All
>                 1) I do not understand what the accelerators are for
>                 "Select All" and "Deselect All"?  Ctrl-A-a is what
>                 exactly? 
>                 
>                 2) Ben said these are now Message body selection only
>                 and not Select All Messages in the List View -- that
>                 is confusing, perhaps these should move to the Message
>                 Menus?  Of course a counterargument could be: Select
>                 belongs on the Edit menu and we could have: 
>                             Edit / Select-> All Messages
>                                                All Text in Message 
>                 
>                 Not sure of right answer but as currently spec'ed this
>                 seems inconsistent. 
>                 
>                 3) Is Select All a new feature when reading a message
>                 now? In Evo 2.0.3... Select All is not available when
>                 reading a message in its own window so we do not do
>                 this today (although I do wish it did :)).  And as a
>                 new feature, will Select All select everything
>                 including the headers or just the message body? 
>                 
>                 4) Deselect All is a new menu item and as such I guess
>                 a new feature too?  What does it when reading a
>                 message?  What does it do when composing or editing a
>                 message? Where is focus? 

	Yikes!  Select All and Deselect All will be available whenever a
message is shown.  (In a new window or when the Message Preview is
shown.)  They simply select everything in the message or remove the
current selection.  This is a new feature.  It also appears in the
context menus for the message.

I envisioned Select All Messages to exist in the Folder menu since you
are acting on a group of messages in a Folder, but I can imagine people
looking for this in the Edit menu as well.  User testing is probably
needed to see where people hunt first.  The accelerator for the original
Select All (now Select All Messages) behavior was purposefully kept the
same to ease migration.

> C) View Menu
>         a) Filter Messages- I do not believe anything that processes
>         messages should be in the View Menus.
>         Aren't View menus usually only used for changing what or how
>         something looks versus actually taking an action what is seen?
>         This seems very misplaced. 

	Filter is probably bad terminology here.  This submenu is intended to
hide messages in the folder you are viewing that you don't want to see.
This is modeled after the Thunderbird View -> Messages menu.

>         b) List Message As -> 
>         I do not understand this menu item -- I eventually figured out
>         its a replacement for the "Current View" plus "Message
>         Display" cascades. Seems like it is combining apples and
>         oranges and trying to give them a different, possibly less
>         useful name. 

	Nope.  This is simply a rename of "Current View".  Maybe a better name
might be "Show Message List As" although that's a little long.   I'd
wager that almost no one knows what "Current View" does and the title
isn't much of a help.

>         c) Zoom In/Zoom Out/Normal Size -- If this is a replacement
>         for Text Size in messages and does not affect anything else,
>         please keep this Text Size (as Firefox does).  Zoom In/Out
>         imply scaling graphing images and more to me than it will do.
>         If this is a new Evo feature, what is it? 

	No.  You're right.  This is text size.  This is exactly word for word,
accelerator for accelerator as the HIG.  We can change the language if
we need to, but users should be used to this terminology. 

>         d) Where did the Character Encoding menu go? 

	Still there.  I didn't touch it.  (Too afraid!)

> D) Folder Menu 
>         a) What is "New Search Folder?" If this is vFolders, how do I
>         edit or manage them? 

	The original idea was to put the VFolder management in the Preferences.
This has been scrapped for lack of time, and hopefully fixed to your
liking in the latest mockup.  

Edit -> Manage Search Folders -- 
Replaces 
 Tools -> Virtual Folder Editor

Message -> Create Rule -> Search Folder on XXXXX...  
Replaces:
 Tools -> Create Virtual Folder From Message -> VFolder on XXXXX...

>         b) Subscriptions -- Shouldn't this be on the Edit menu near
>         Preferences similar to the Pilot settings?  This will appear
>         whether a user has an IMAP account or not, correct? And it
>         requires the user to select a server to point to, so I
>         recommend we put it w/ account settings. 

	Well, It should be "Folder Subscriptions" if it goes in the Edit menu.
But I have no strong feelings about it either way.  Although the
configuration section of the edit menu is starting to get a little long.
I put my foot down about Folder -> Preferences.  That stays where it
is!  :^)

>         c) Mark Messages as Read and Check Messages for Junk seem
>         misplaced here. This works selected messages not an entire
>         folder so I would have probably looked in the new Messages
>         menu first.  Perhaps I understand the Folder menu entirely? I
>         thought it was Folder operations like Rename or New or the
>         things currently on the Folder right mouse menu.

	"Check Messages for Junk" was a mis-placed menu item.  It should not
have been in the Folder menu.  (It was supposed to check ALL the
messages in a folder to see if they were Junk.  For a good time try that
on a folder with 500 or more messages.)  

	I think "Mark Messages as Read" is a reasonable menu item.  It marks
all the messages in a folder as read.  A similar menu item exists in the
Message menu that only marks the SELECTED messages as read.

>         d) Expunge seems lost w/o Empty Trash next to it. I do not
>         know the right answer here but expect users will choose the
>         wrong one if they do not see the other near it -- that is
>         probably the wrong answer to. :)  
>         
>         e) Where is Empty Trash? Did I miss it? 

	It's in the File menu.

> E) Message Menu
>         a) Open in New Window -- this was on File menu before which
>         seemed ok but here it looks weird like it belongs on Window
>         but I do not think I'd like that either. Probably should check
>         other apps for guidance.
>         
>         b) Go To cascade - Not sure about this, but isn't document
>         navigation usually handled in the Edit menus like Find?  Not
>         sure I'd like Go To there either, but just asking re:
>         consistency.
>         
>         c) Mark As cascade
>         This is pure me-as-user opinion: everything on this menu I use
>         ALL the time and I use the menus for these settings, please do
>         not bury these on a cascade!!! 

	You do?  Since all of these items are available in the toolbar or on
the Message List, I thought it was pretty safe to move them out a
little.  In fact, this was one of the first changes I made.  Would
creating accelerators help?  What are you using these for?

>         d) Caret Mode - what is this? 

	Basically this allows you to move around the message as if it were a
normal editable document...  But not edit it.  It used to be the default
in Outlook, if I recall.  The name is fairly standard.  Firefox uses it
as well for example.  (Although they bury it deeper.)  I've moved this
option to the View menu now.  It's mostly used as an accessibility
feature.

> F) Windows Menu
>         It seems to be the Components such as Mail, Calendar, Contacts
>         and Tasks should be on this menu instead of their own Tools
>         menu.  You are switching the context completely so they could
>         be a Window.  

Not a bad idea, but the Window menu is gone now since the hacking time
would exceed the deadlines.

> G) Tools Menu 
> 
>         If we move the components to Window, and do not put anything
>         else here, we could possibly remove Tools completely.  

I expect the Tools menu will probably fill up with plugin menus.

> 
> On Fri, 2004-12-17 at 17:44 -0500, Benjamin Kahn wrote: 
> > I've been looking at simplifying the Evolution context menus in the mail
> > component.  My proposals are here:
> > http://primates.ximian.com/~glesage/wiki/doku.php?id=evolution:menus
> > 
> > I have created a patch which implements most of these proposals (I have
> > yet to change the context menu when over an email address.)  
> > 
> > I'm looking at the other menus in Evolution -- you can see my proposal
> > for the Evolution mailer menus at: 
> > http://primates.ximian.com/~glesage/wiki/doku.php?id=evolution:menus:mailer
> > 
> > Patch for the context menus is attached.