Re: [Nautilus-list] Nautilus user testing at MIT

[thristian atdot org]

On Fri, Jan 05, 2001 at 01:46:11AM +0100, Nicolas Mailhot wrote:
> Le ven, 05 jan 2001 01:12:14, Reinout van Schouwen a écrit :
> > I think it also has to do with the fact that web pages
> > take 
> > exceptionally long to load, compared with the launching of
> > an 
> > application. What is wrong with the wait cursor above a
> > application 
> > that's busy, given that the busy-state will last no longer
> > than a few seconds?
> 
> Nothing except :
> 
> * it may be confusing to some users (cursor not in app, app
> stuck and no hourglass !)

But that's how it *works*! That was certainly the behaviour today as I
used Win98 at work, that's what I expect when using X11 at home -
while Netscape's laying out lots of tables, my cursor becomes a
wristwatch while inside the Netscape window, and is usable elsewhere.
The only program that should set the wait cursor for the entire screen
is probably kswapd. :)

> * unlike throbbers, difficult to see state of all windows at
> a glance.

That's not a problem of the cursor, that's a problem of "difficult to
see all windows at once" and "difficult to see state of an individual
window". Difficulty 1 is almost unavoidable unless you remove X's
capability to display overlapping windows, and Difficulty 2 is the
problem of the app vendor.

<snip>

> Cursor forms are the wrong way to go IMHO because they won't
> work for more than one window at a time, and focus questions
> are sufficiently confusing under X right now without adding
> the complexity of « which window controls the cursor form ».

The complexity of "which window controls the cursor form" is the same
complexity as "which app am I pointing at", which is the same as
"which app has the focus" (in focus-follows-mouse). That is to say,
not a lot - less than the sum total of those three processes together,
because the final mental model is something like:

cursor over a window means:
	- the window is listening to me
	- the cursor tells me about that window


Mind you, I wouldn't want to use the cursor for every possible
interesting app state, just to tell the difference between "I'm ready
and waiting for input" vs. "Hold on, I'll be with you shortly".

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