Re: [Usability]Nautilus tree sidebar / location field

[Sunnanvind Fenderson <sunnanvind fenderson com>]

Hi,

Reinout van Schouwen <reinout cs vu nl> writes:

> Hello Sunnanvind,
> 
> > > 1. Why is a transition path from web to CLI desirable?
> > It might be, for some. I love CLIs,
> 
> You'll have to agree with me this is not much of an argument. ;-)

"It might be, for some" is an argument, though. For *some* users,
maybe 5% albeit this is just a guess, having this transition path will
make them love nautilus more in retrospect. I'm imagining some CLI
geezer or script wizard saying "Oh, yeah, I've done a lot of CLI work
in my day, and for this I thank the location bar" or something like
that. :)

> Well, me too, as long as there's autocompletion available. But that's not
> the issue here.

It's not the issue wrt moving the location bar, but it is very much an
issue as an answer to your question 1.

> I can agree to all that, but I really doubt a location bar is essential
> for inducing users to explore the CLI, if that even were a goal of the
> GNOME project.

Essential, I don't know, but I think it's a huge benefit.  As for
exploring the CLI - well, gnome does provide a terminal, and a
nautilus scripts-folder so I'd say "yes". I can imagine (I've got a
pretty vivid imagination as people may have noticed by now) an office
where one person has started exploring the CLI and is now happily
churning out scripts for the other peoples script-folders to improve
their productivity. "Martha, could you whip me up a script that
lowercases extensions?" "Sure, honey"

> > I might be surprised. I'm a pretty emotional person who gets surprised
> > easily. How many percent of current browser users don't know that?
> 
> You got me there, I only have the anecdotical evidence of my own
> experience with inexperienced computer users, no percentages.

I haven't seen it myself (and I've worked with slighly less than a
hundred inexperienced computer users) but let's say it's several
percent. The location bar isn't exactly harmful for these people
either since it provides "where am I" feedback which keeps the "paths"
concept vivid in their minds.

And sooner or later, one way or another they're going to find out that
you can type things there.

> Granted, though if the applet<>nautilus interaction worked two ways, the
> applet would always reflect the path of the nautilus window that last
> gained focus and the user would get another cue that those two relate to
> each other.

It might and it mightn't work, only studies can tell. I can imagine
(imagination time again) that people wouldn't immediately mentally
link that applet with the browser window.

> > so I won't *complain* if this is what happens, but I don't see why the
> > location bar must be killed at all costs when it's benefits are so
> > big.
> 
> You're overstating things. The location bar mustn't be killed at all
> costs, but I'm trying to make a cost/benefit evalution of moving the
> location bar out of individual Nautilus windows. So far, I've seen more
> benefits than costs but that might change.

I think the other way around but the location of the location bar ;)
isn't something I care much about. I'm not really trying to be the
die-hard advocate of leaving it in place, it just sounds that way. :)

Sunnan