Re: [Usability] questions for the UI gurus

[Bryan Clark <bclark redhat com>]

On Sat, 2004-07-31 at 17:25 +0200, Reinout van Schouwen wrote:
> On Sat, 31 Jul 2004, Davyd Madeley wrote:
> 
> > 1) how should this dialog look in your eyes?
> 
> In addition to what Steven already said: the alert should probably use
> the stock information icon (light bulb). Furthermore the string '(0%,
> charged)' looks a bit cryptic. 'Charged' seems to indicate the opposite
> of what the message is warning against. It might as well be omitted.
> 
> > should I merge this patch?
> > http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=131322#c9
> 
> Given the importance of the warning I'm inclined to say yes, provided
> that interaction with other windows isn't prohibited (i.e. don't make it
> system modal).

I was just going to recommend a system modal dialog ;-)

The dialog has a [OK] button to clear it from the screen, so interaction
with the other windows isn't prohibited as soon as you acknowledge the
dialog.  Since there is a serious risk of data loss when you lose power
I think a system modal dialog is ok here.  

A side note, I don't think it's possible to get this design correct when
we just think about this dialog by itself, we really should look at what
we're expecting the user to do and how we're going to present further
information to them.  (i.e. lets look at the whole problem, not just
this dialog)  Here's a few reasons why I don't think we can get this
dialog right if we just look at it by itself.

What are we expecting the user to do with this dialog's information?
	1 plug in right away?
	2 continue working with dialog up?
	3 shutdown computer immediately?
	4 throw feces at the computer screen?
	5 plug the computer in eventually?
	6 send Davyd an email asking what to do next?

Each of these (1,2,3,4,5) require us to notify the user in a separate
way.  Number 4 would probably require some animated instruction in order
for people to get it right.  Off the top of my head I would see this
dialog as indicating to the person that the computer is unplugged, the
battery is critically low and they need to correct this.  From this
point the battery applet might then become a better indicator of
critical time left, whereas normally it just shows overall battery
status.  Showing the percentage of power left in the dialog isn't that
much use to the person, what does 3% actually mean?  The amount of time
left is good, but best if it remains displayed to the user somehow.
I think most useful is showing the time left in the applet after you're
below a certain percentage.  Showing battery time is always way off when
you're "high on battery life"(tm) since the computer cannot predict the
type of usage that will take place, so percentage values make the most
sense then.  However after you've warned the user they are running out
of time, you need to be more precise.

I'm on irc.gimp.net/#usability for a while if people want to discuss an
interaction model and then come back to this thread with a
recommendation, discuss, rinse and repeat?  I always find it tough to
work everything out over tons of email threads. :-\

~ Bryan