Re: [Usability] A (rather long) list of GNOME usability issues

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On Fri, 14 Oct 2005, Jason Day wrote:

> Date: Fri, 14 Oct 2005 14:01:01 -0700
> From: Jason Day <jason s day gmail com>
> To: Usability gnome org
> Subject: [Usability] A (rather long) list of GNOME usability issues
>
> This list was posted by Wolki, on the Ubuntu Linux user forums. Most of his
> points are GNOME issues, rather than specific to Ubuntu, and I felt that he
> had a number of good points, that the developers should see. Here is the
> link:
> http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=75886

I'll attempt to summarize and respond to some of the issues

Raising Windows

  no idea

Drag and Drop saving

   nice to have.  there was some suggestion of making the window icon
  (usually seen in the top left corner) and making it draggable to provide
  a consistent method for drag and drop saving.  This may be an issue of
  filing a request on an app by app basis but hopefully someone else can
  add more detail.  (I've always liked how on the Mac you could drag
  objects out of the browser straight onto the desktop.)

dot-files, wants a tidier home directory even when hidden files are shown

  not a problem high priority problem in my personal opinion but maybe
  others will think it is worth tackling (but my bet is on people
  impolitely suggesting he leave hidden files hidden).  I'm not even going
  to start on people using their Home directory as their desktop and then
  complaining about it.

improve discoverability of Nautilus backgrounds and emblems

  file a request against nautilus I guess

open location dialog spurious errors (my opinion not his)

  something I hope will be addressed or made irrelevant by larger changes


Problem: A folder is a window. Unless it's a symlink, then a folder is
multiple windows.
Suggestion: Treat links to folders like the original folder.

sounds about right, an issue to for the Nautilus developers I guess.


Problem: The unix directory structure is great and useful, but very
confusing to people new to linux,

Personally I've toyed with the idea of hiding everything below
home and then giving users an easier view of the file system (what
they are entitled to see) rooted at ~ for example
~/Applications/
but everyone seems to have ideas of their own on this and then there are
the people using their home directory as their desktop complicating
matters.

Icons on Desktop that *aren't* on Desktop

  it is stuff like this that makes me want to have the aforementioned
  fake view of the filesystem mounted at ~ but if I recall correctly there
  are a variety of messy implemenation details which complicate the whole
  issue of removable drives

Problem: There is no undo.

Calum Benson isn't happy about it either perhaps some people need to
come up with clear plans and help a developer implement it.  again an
issue which should be discussed with the nautilus developers.

Middle click in browser mode

  ... (might respond to this later, I'm sure the Nautilus developers will
have answers)


These lists are a good start but it would be a big help if this guy could
follow up on his suggestions and file a shedload of bug reports and
feature requests and then try to identify if any of these issue are
already under consideration.  if you are really enthusiastic about his
suggestions perhaps you might help out and file requests for him based on
his ideas and or let him know if these ideas are already being discussed.


(in hindsight I release the formatting I've used for this mail is a bit
mad but I'm not changing it now, hope it is readable enough)



- Alan