Re: [Usability] Productivity -> Office ?

[Seth Nickell <snickell stanford edu>]

On Thu, 2001-10-04 at 18:02, Nils Pedersen wrote:
> Yes - somebody else had that suggestion...
> 
> I'm not too keen on productivity either...
> 
> My (warped and disturbed) rational for not changing
> productivity to office was that I couldn't imagine
> the likes of star office (and similar large office
> type applications) appearing under that category; 
> they would probably want to apear at the minimum 
> as a sibling of productivity. Maybe I didn't
> want another level of submenus? 

> But I guess they may be appeased by a launcher on 
> the panel if we 'forced/suggested' them to be under 
> an office category?

Office -> Word Processor (OpenOffice)
Office -> Spreadsheet (OpenOffice)
Office -> Clipart Manager (OpenOffice)
...etc...

Another aspect of this is that I think its more convenient for users to
run a tool for the thing they are trying to do (write a letter, crunch
tax numbers, whatever) than to launch "StarOffice" and then have to
launch the sub-application of StarOffice they want. In some ways this
gives greater visibility to big suites like StarOffice, actually, since
they get way more icons (though I realize it may go against the "appear
integrated" agenda).

I think one of the great curses of Windows that (owing to the bulk of
Linux applications not being done by companies) we can fight in the
style guide is the horrid:

Adobe->Adobe Photoshop 6.0->Adobe Photoshop
Adobe->Adobe Photoshop 6.0->Adobe Photoshop README
Adobe->Adobe Photoshop 6.0->Adobe Photoshop Help
Corel->Corel Draw->Corel Draw 45
etc

Sort of crap. Excessive branding is often contrary to the user's
interests. It also sometimes happens, I think, because application
developers & companies get an over-inflated of their own importance...
Is the fact that Photoshop is made by Adobe so damn important that it
should be made a part of the MENU SYSTEM? Plus then people feel
obligated to put enough menu entries in their sub-category to justify it
being a sub-category in the first place, leading to the README & the
Help file, and lord knows what else appearing in the main menu system.
Crraaaaaaaack!

Similarly, I don't think its appropriate for OpenOffice to push itself
based on productisation (they may try and/or succeed, but where the
usability project has influence I don't think we should be encouraging
this). GNOME has lots of office programs besides OpenOffice (of varying
degrees of quality). Many of them in areas that OO doesn't cover like
finance. OO isn't really a GNOME program anyway, though I realize it may
be a critical aspect of the GNOME desktop since various adopters of
GNOME will want the extended features OO can offer.

To users I think this sort of productisation is sort of silly... Why
should I have to care if Program X is part of the StarOffice product or
if its part of GNOME Office? The only reason I can think of is that
StarOffice doesn't use the GNOME interface and hence provides a
different and potentially confusing environment and putting in its own
category would make it easier for users to expect this confusion.

-Seth