Re: [Usability] The basic problem of creating new documents

["Curtis C. Hovey" <sinzui cox net>]

On Tue, 2004-01-27 at 18:44, Daniel Borgmann wrote:

> > Instead of selecting Save As you could do what some people on this list
> > have been pushing for and get rid of Save entirely.  Seeing as you are
> > overhauling your software it seems like an ideal opportunity to take this
> > direction and show the naysayers (like me) that autosave can be done in a
> > reliable and unobtrusive manner (never lose any data and dont be too
> > slow).
> 
> That's (almost) exactly what I do, but it doesn't change the basic fact
> that a document has to exist before it can be opened and edited...

You are rightly making a distinction between _New from template_, and
_New document_.  We do need a global registry of document types that the
desktop is aware of.  Instead of deciding the best application for
creating a document, the user would be better served by a dialog asking
what kind of document the user is making, and it selects the
application.  The user need not learn which applications handle what to
do a simple task like create a letter.  The dialog should be accessible
from the Actions menu and as a folder context menu.  This would be a
valuable feature for users who are new to GNOME, and provide a
consistent mechanism for GNOME and distributors to select the primary
application.

> 
> > As soon as a few words have been typed they should automatically be saved
> > to a default location such as ~/Documents/
> > with a default name such as "Note 1", "Note 2" ... "Note $N+1", or perhaps
> > "Note 1 - the first few words of the document"
> > (I know some users who always put a title first thing in their document,
> > might be interesting to encourage that habit)
> > 
> > Hope you get the idea.
> 
> I don't like this very much to be honest. First of all it's no real
> improvement, it still breaks the object metaphor as the user has to
> start the _application_ first and work on a virtual buffer, which will
> then magically transform to a document somewhere on the hard disk. It
> also doesn't seem very practical to me, because I'd rather create a new
> document right at the place where I'm currently working at (just like
> I'd create another sub-folder).
> Of course this is indeed a possibility, I could add a "New Text
> Document" item in the applications menu which would just create an empty
> document on the desktop or somewhere else. It just wouldn't be very
> elegant or comfortable. :/

If we relabeled the menu items from 'Spreadsheet' to 'New spreadsheet',
you scenario is fixed I think.  After all, many applications start a
blank document when done is provided at launch time.

This does bring up some non-document application issues.  These kinds of
apps don't have a file menu so there is no way to say they create
anything. In the case of the System Monitor, the is no new.  Some
applications, instant messaging for example, don't have documents, but
do have connections, channels, people--we could apply the object
metaphor, but that might be awkward.

-- 
__C U R T I S  C.  H O V E Y____________________
sinzui cox net
Guilty of stealing everything I am.