Re: [Usability] Quicky review of Seahorse encryption key manager

[Nate Nielsen <nielsen-list memberwebs com>]

Alan Horkan wrote:
> I do not see a grippy on the lower right corner which suggests you aren't
> using the standard status bar widget.

Was using GnomeAppbar, switched to GtkStatusbar.

> The first dialog includes the following labels on the Tabs:
> "My Personal Keys"
> "Keys I trust"
> "Keys I've Collected"
> 
> This kind of informality is out of keeping and inconsistent with the style
> of Gnome.  Microsoft have even stated they will drop the "My" prefix in
> front of "My Documents" in their next release, about a decade overdue.
> I would encourage you to also avoid the "My" prefix.
> 
> Abbreviations should generally be avoided to maintain maximum clarity.
> There is no benifit in trying to compact things ("I've") as you need to
> leave enough extra space for translations which may not be as terse as
> English.
> 
> More appropriate labels would be:
> "Personal Keys"
> "Trusted Keys"
> "Collected Keys".

I've changed all but the first tab label. As Murray pointed out
"Personal Keys" is ambiguous. I'm all out of ideas on this one, ie: How
to remove the 'my' but still convey:

 * They're keys I've created. My very own keys. Only for me.
 * These aren't the keys of people I feel 'personal' about.

The concepts behind encryption (and PGP in particular) are so confusing
for people than being unambiguous is necessary in the labels.

Not to say seahorse has arrived in this regard (there are dialogs that
need reworking badly) but it's a goal to strive for. This makes our
label and description needs slightly different from other projects.

For example one thing you'll notice once you install seahorse is that
there are check boxes and descriptions that have to do with trust which
look like:

 [x] I have verified that this key belongs to who it says it does.
 [x] I trust signatures on other keys made with this key.

These are in a sort of contract or 'legal form' wording on purpose. This
helps convey the weight, effects, and idea behind the action properly.

> The "Create a New Key" dialog has conflicting mnemonics, the same letter
> is used for both _Cancel and _Continue.  

Fixed.

> I see a Tab heading labelled "Name/Signature" it would be preferable to
> pick one or the other or a different lable entirely to cover both
> concepts.

PGP names and signatures are intertwined (especially when looking at
your own private key. I've changed this to 'Names and Signatures' to
make it more readable.

> Acronyms (and abbrevations) should generally be avoided to maintain
> maximum clarity.  They obscure information that might otherwise inform and
> educate the user.  Intelligent well educated people can be blocked out by
> acronyms by virtue of not knowing the jargon of your subject area but
> given the chance the full words would make much more sense.  For example
> SSH is short for Secure Shell (SSH) and using the full words (possibly
> followed by the shortened form after it in brackets) give users a concept
> they can hold on to "Secure Shell"  rather than a much more obtuse
> acronym.  They still might not quite understand the shell part but at
> least they have a chance of gaining that little extra bit of understanding
> if you provide the information.  Learnability.

Good point. I've changed it to use 'Secure Shell' throughout seahorse
messages and dialogs (with a few exceptions when referring to the actual
ssh command).

As far as PGP, that's probably more familiar than what it stands for, so
I think that could probably stay as is.

Thanks again. Looking forward to more comments and usability suggestions.

Cheers,
Nate Nielsen