Re: [Usability]Re: PATCH: Bug 82107, Turn off nautilus sidebar and location bar by default

[Patrick <pabos glypsube org>]

I'll add third that. If the location bar were turned off by default, my
first order of business when I first used Nautilus would be to turn it
back on.

If I were a new user in a Nautilus window and the sidebar and location
bar were off by default, I would be thinking where am I? Then if I
became familiar with it I would probably always expect to see the
nautilus window open at the same point because it would become the
reference point of how I find things. Mentally I might imagine "oh yeah,
this screen of pictures...then click here..."

A location bar gives another method of relating information and
remembering connections between places. Similarly, while I find the side
tab "edit with" buttons unaesthetic, and they may, in the short term, be
confusing, I think they help build into the user's expectation that
there are multiple ways of editing a file and more generally that there
are multiple ways of doing many tasks. I believe, facilitating this kind
of generalized thinking (ie. "I can edit this file with several
applications, which is the best one for what I need to do?") is a major
goal of usability. A large measure of the usability of something to a
user depends on how much the user understands it. The user's
understanding of a computer as a tool should follow the thought process
of "what do I need to do?" or "how can I best do this task?" rather than
"how do I do that again?" (ie. a memorized procedure) The how of doing
something, is the learned skill, not the end result, and it seems
reasonable to assume that this can take some time, teaching and
explanation apart from making the interface so simplistic that regular
tasks become more complex with it.

In my experience, if a user is scared by a location bar they would
ignore it. If they don't understand it and aren't curious they'll leave
it alone until someone explains something about it (ie. "it shows you
where you are" and then demonstrate deleting tail directories to jump
down directory levels quickly) or if they are curious they'll notice the
relationship of the location bar text changing when the left/right, up
arrows are used and learn its use intuitively.

As for the user expecting it to be a web browser, would it be possible
to take http:// requests and immediately open the default browser with
this address?

Patrick


On Sat, 2002-08-31 at 22:37, Damien Covey wrote:
> I personally would hate to see the location bar go.  The dumbing down of 
> the interface is one reason that I have left WinXP behind me in 
> preference for Linux.  And even for "non advanced" users it is usefull 
> to have to location bar there.  How else can I obtain from a user over 
> the phone what directory they are in.  The answer "temp" doesnt really 
> help me much, it could be /home/user/temp/ or /temp.  I'm sure there are 
> other circumstances where this is the case.
> 
> David Watson wrote:
> 
> >Hi Dave B & C,
> >
> >I know, I know...  I said wasn't going to be sending this email.  Well,
> >now that I've heard that Ximian and RedHat plan on turning the side pane
> >off by default, I feel that its necessary to defend the side pane one last
> >time.
> >
> >On 31 Aug 2002, Dave Bordoley wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>This patch turns off the location bar and sidebar by default.CCing
> >>usability list on this to get there opinions as well. Below are some of
> >>my comments from the bug.
> >>
> >>dave
> >>
> >>-----------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>IMHO, the default nautilus look is to cluttered and can be confusing to
> >>users.
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >  
> >
> >>1) The location bar should be off by default.
> >>   First, the location bar is a feature that is used by fairly advance
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >People can/must learn to use the location bar in order use the web.
> >Everyone uses the web.  Hence, it is not an advanced feature.
> >
> >  
> >
> >>users.  Since it requires knowledge of the layout of the unix filesystem
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >Nautilus uses a uri scheme so that it can view more than just UNIX
> >filesystems.  So even w/o knowledge of the UNIX filesystem layout, it can
> >be useful.
> >
> >Furthermore, only the complete path fully identifies a given location, so
> >if we were to turn the location bar off we would need make the full path
> >conveniently available from somewhere else (often the title bar is
> >suggested).  However, if we're going to display the full path anyway,
> >thereby exposing the user to the UNIX filesystem (oh noo!) we lose
> >nothing by making that path editable.
> >
> >  
> >
> >>to be of any use. To a user new to unix, being able to enter in a
> >>location doesn't mean anything if they aren't familiar with the unix
> >>directory system.
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >To a user new to computers being able to right click on an icon doesn't
> >mean anything if they aren't familiar with the icon/desktop metaphor.
> >
> >?
> >
> >  
> >
> >>  Which leads to my second point, though more thorough user testing is
> >>needed, I suspect that for the vast majority of new users (particularly
> >>windows converts) the presence of the location bar strongly suggests
> >>that nautilus can be used as a web browser (I've actually experienced
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >I have experienced this as well.  IMHO, the correct solution is to give
> >users what they want.  We should depend on a web view.
> >
> >And no, I don't believe that web browsing and file browsing can't be done
> >with the same app.
> >
> >  
> >
> >>2) The sidebar should be off by default
> >>   The sidebar takes up an enormous amount of screen space( about 1/5 of
> >>the nautilus window) while providing little to no general user benefit.
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >The side pane is useful for:
> >
> >a) opening an editing application when using a viewer.
> >b) adding annotations to directories and files.
> >c) and obviously, accessing side pane views, some yet to be invented,
> >some simply needing to be fixed (e.g. the tree view).
> >d) face it, the side pane just plain looks nice (e.g.
> >www.cs.ucr.edu/~dwatson).
> >
> >  
> >
> >>The default tabs, notes and history, are not commonly used enough to
> >>justify using up the such a large portion of screen space.
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >Actually I use notes all the time (incidently, it might be nice if we
> >could dnd notes to the desktop).
> >
> >By leaving the side pane on users will be aware of the notes, history
> >and tree panes.  It will be more difficult for users to discover
> >these features then it will be for them to turn them off if they are
> >unwanted.  It will also be less likely that new uses for the side pane
> >will be developed (if it defaults to off then it defaults to unused).
> >
> >Finally, though this is a less important point, both netscape and windows
> >default to showing the side pane.
> >
> >As always, just MHO,
> > - David
> >
> >  
> >
>