Re: [Synaptic-devel] Synaptic development

[Sebastian Heinlein]

Am Mi, den 12.11.2003 schrieb Gustavo Niemeyer um 18:29:
> Install/remove packages?! So what are we talking about here!? It looks
> like we're talking about different features of synaptic. If you
> install/remove packages in your system, you do use the toggle buttons.

I just want to find out what the most often used functions are. These
are the ones which should be supported the best way.

> > I just want one clear way and not two not always visible ones and one
> > which requires an additional step of abstraction. Where is the problem?
> 
> All of them are quite visible here. Are you using vpaned? I personally
> don't like it, and think it just hides a lot of stuff.

I use both of them. The vpaned is very comfortable on high resolutions,
since the buttons are in the upper part of the window.

> > The size of the buttons in hpaned are at the moment extended to the full
> > width of the detail area. So the length of the label does not matter.
> 
> Yes, it does matter. I can't rollback the change and send you some
> screenshots if you don't belive. But I'd be glad if you could perceive
> that for yourself.

Again my fault. I always mix up vpaned and hpaned. I was talking about
vpaned. You are right concerning the hpaned.

> > The buttons can not be rearranged in one line since then we would again
> > get the effect of resizing detail areas.
> > 
> > "Online Documentation" in hpaned had the the advantage that it was the
> > longest label and also a static one. So the detail/control area would
> > not resize. But I haven't considered that it is available on a few
> > debian unstable installations only.
> 
> You're being fully targeted for debian, and that's not nice, since
> Synaptic is meant to be a multi-distribution software. We don't have
> "Online Documentation" (which is pretty long by itself, IMO) in
> RPM systems.

This was one error of mine. But I also made some ui fixes for RPM
systems, since Michael is on Debian only. I even made a new RPM SPEC
file. So I am aware of the multi distribution issue. I just forget this
sometimes... :)

I am also on no crusade against the toggle buttons.

> Let's concentrate on the problem then. What's the problem with the
> toggle buttons? Where are the user complains you talk about?

I know how important a good problem description is to estimate possible
solutions.

But I cannot do this in this case. Since it is just an unfamiliar
feeling people have using the toggle buttons. 

I and the Gnome Human Interface Guideline think that triggering an
action from a radio, options or toggle is no good way.

The most intuitive way would be to use an action buttons. And in the
ideal case this buttons should not change function and label, so that a
user can remember them easily.

But the 'problem' is that synaptic is too complex and provides too many
functions to use one button for every action.

The check box style of many software managers (yast and
redhat-config-packages) is also only useful on "install/remove" managers
only - and synaptic goes far beyond this.

My suggested solutions also violates all of these principles. But it was
just a suggestion and perhaps a starting point for new ideas.

> Nope. I have heard a lot of random comments from Conectiva users,
> though. Most of them seem to be confused because they know nothing about
> package updating or package systems. We must try to solve the problem
> with these cases, but we must *not* hurt the general usage of the
> software because of them. Otherwise these people won't like the software
> after they *do* learn the general concepts.

This was never my intention. "So let's get serious" :)

Perhaps we should consider introducing a first start dialog, which
explains the queuing stuff.

> > But perhaps we should consider to get more opinions on this. So I would
> > suggest that we request for a review from the gnome usability team, when
> > 0.46 is out.
> 
> That would be very nice. Please, ask them to review in a Debian system
> and on an RPM based system.

Ok.

Regards,

Sebastian