[Fwd: Re: [Usability] Downloads recommendation]

[Marco Pesenti Gritti <marco gnome org>]

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• From: Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>
• To: Marco Pesenti Gritti <marco gnome org>
• Subject: Re: [Usability] Downloads recommendation
• Date: Sun, 4 Jan 2004 15:46:27 +0000 (GMT)

Free free to forward this to the epiphany list and CC me, I've changed a
few small bits and pieces from my previous mail though because I wasn't
feeling particularly lucid when i first wrote it.

On Sun, 4 Jan 2004, Marco Pesenti Gritti wrote:

<snip>

> On Fri, 2004-01-02 at 19:41, Alan Horkan wrote:
> > due to the lateness of my reply I have decided not to post directly to the
> > usability list.

> > > From: Marco Pesenti Gritti <marco gnome org>
> > > To: usability gnome org
> > > Subject: [Usability] Downloads recommendation
> > >
> > > Hi,
> > >
> > > we experimented with a different downloader design with 1.2. While I
> > > think we reached some interesting results, it doesnt seem to be mature
> > > enough to actually make 1.2. Maybe you can help us solving the problems
> > > or showing us that we are going in a wrong direction.

> > > [Cut/Paste from a Dave Bordoley mail explaining the controversial
> > > changes]

> > > So there are two majors changes we've made to the downloader ui in
> > > epiphany 1.2. First we've added a default downloader folder to which all
> > > files downloaded via the context menu 'download link" action are saved
> > > to. In addition we've made click a link automatically open a linked file
> > > (if it is considered safe).


> > > Default Download Directory and Download Link Behavior
> >
> > If you can I would encourage you to look at GetRight which I used quite
> > alot when I used Windows.  It features a Browser which interprets web
> > pages and displays the links as if they were a file listing.  This very
> > conveniently allows you to sort and select, and you can quickly grab all
> > the links of a certain type (e.g. all the links to .mp3 files) from a page
> > and download them in one go).
> >
> > This feature makes it quite easy to leech large amounts of files very
> > quickly.
> >
> > Unfortunately using a single download directory, or even using a seperate
> > download directory for a few major MIME types
> > ~/Documents
> > ~/Pictures
> > ~/Videos
> > very quickly becomes unmanagable but then I dont know how you handle name
> > collisions.
> >
> > The file browser includes an option to recreate the directory structures
> > so if you saved a file from
> > http://gnome.org/folder1/folder2/file.jpg
> > it would go to your default directory and be put in
> > ../folder1/folder2/file.jpg
> > As far as I remember this avoids all name collisions.  Quite a few web
> > pages have a ./thumbs/ and ./images/ with images files that have the same
> > name file001.jpg and that caused me quite a few problems
> >
> > I usually prefer to manually use a single folder called
> > ../gnome.org-folder1-folder2/file.jpg
> > and I usually also create a shortcut containing a link to the website I
> > have saved so I can be absolutely sure of where I downloaded it from.
> >
> > I usually forget where I downloaded things from originally and I'd really
> > love to be able to automaticlly have a comment/metadata such
> > as the following added to downloaded web pages
> >
> > <!--
> > downloaded on  $DATE
> > downloaded from location
> > http://gnome.org/monkey/blah/webpage.html
> > -->
> >
> > > The important thing is to make access to the downloads folder fast. We
> > > really have two options here. Currently we are defaulting to the
> > > desktop.
> > > This decision to the best of my knowledge is really based upon i18n
> > > concerns. Honestly I'd much prefer a desktop subfolder called Downloads,
> > > but too many flame wars have erupted about using non-localized folder
> > > names.
> >
> > I'd want to default to my $HOME directory.  For some users this would make
> > absolutely no difference but I dont use my Home directory as my desktop
> > directory.

and I dont think $HOME == $DESKTOP is a good idea either I just haven't
been able to rationalize and justify it yet.

A $DOWNLOADS directory doesn't sound like a bad idea, and in
> > English it would be Downloads and in other languages they could localise
> > it as they see fit, I dont see why there needs to be a problem.

In fact a Downloads directory sounds like a very good idea.

I've previously advocated creating a bunch of default directories to help
users manage their files, the simple act of providing a user with a
default folder to put documents in dramatically increases the likelyhood
of them making some basic efforts to sort their files.

At the very least users should be provided with Documents, Pictures, and
some sort of default Music/Video/Multimedia and folders but it is a pain
to get people to agree and others keep going on about longer term
solutions like "Storage" and "Medusa" instead of taking the simple of
providing default folders a step that offers immediate benifits.

> > > Its also been suggested that we should go even further and support
> > > multiple default folders based on mime types. While the idea is sound,
> > > the real solution to this issue is something akin to search folders
> > > implemented at a a level above of the traditional filesystem
> > > (medusa+storage).
> >
> > Subfolders is a solution that works for me, and getright has a bunch of
> > Quickfolders that you can choose from using an additional drop down menu
> > in its custom Save dialog.

As much as possible I would really like Epiphany to push some of their
changes to the desktop as a whole and avoid things like custom Save
Dialogs.  Done right, these features are something that should be part of
the desktop as a whole.  I trust that the Epiphany developers will bring
continue to come up with elegantly simple and uncluttered solutions.

> > > - People that organize their downloads in subfolders feel the new
> > > behavior too slow. They have to remember the name of the file, and use
> > > the filemanager to move it there.
> >
> > people who find this method too slow really should be looking at at
> > download manager program, the only thing I could think of that might be
> > faster would be wget and a bunch of custom scripts but that would require
> > the writing of a bunch of custom scripts.

Just in case I didn't make it clear, i think that subfolders could be
workable and even quicker if the files could be automatically sorted based
on MIME type, I usually seperate out Documents (PDFs, Word Processing,
Presentations and WebPages), Pictures, Videos, and MP3s and sometimes I'll
subcategorize them again roughly based on file formats

> > > - Often the name of the downloaded files are bad like 261a96.ps,
> > > R64838.pdf, Setup.exe. With a file picker you can rename them while
> > > downloading (how many users does it though ...). Doing that later
> > > require to remember the name of the file.
> >
> > if I had the location I originally downloaded the file from then renaming
> > it should be easier to remember later on what I wanted to rename it to.
> >
> > > - Should the files be saved in the downloads dir also when opening them
> > > (click) or just saved in a temporary location and then deleted ?
> >
> > While using Internet Explorer I have abused the browser cache for fast
> > downloads by first clearing it out completel and then visiting the sites I
> > was interested in and when finished simply copying the entire contents of
> > the cache (Internet Explorer cache == "Temporary Internet Folder").
> >
> > > Both behaviors seem to have problems. You dont want to keep around all
> > > files you viewed but, especially on slow connections, you want to keep
> > > some of them.
> >
> > Saving/Caching files for offline viewing is very useful on a slow
> > connection.  When using mozilla I try and leave my cache at about 10 MB
> > which I think is a fair tradeoff.

I really hate using Dialup, I use infrequently at home and until very
recently I was using Netscape 4.  On dialup it was particularly useful to
be able to turn off images and have a toolbar button to turn them back on
as needed on an a per page basis.  [To provide a more modern replacement
for this functionality I keep meaning to put together a custom user
stylesheet (on the user/client side) and hack Mozilla to allow me to "Use
Style" from my preset sheets like the way Opera allows.]

> > > There is the Download link item in context menu but many users doesnt
> > > use context menu and not all downloads start from a link.
> >
> > > - With very small files that does not have an handler we lack feedback.
> > > The download progress dialog is showed and hidden quickly.
> >
> > More user visible feeback is clearly what is needed
> >
> > You could try providing a message in the status bar or try showing the
> > dialog for at least 5 seconds or some other minimum time and then closing
> > automatically if the user ignores the dialog.
> >
> > > - People are used to click on links without worrying about what is going
> > > to happen. With the new behavior you often dont know if a file will be
> > > downloaded or a web page opened. The difference is that you will have a
> > > new window opened, you will need to wait some time to see the document
> > > (the time necessary to download it), a file will be saved on disk, a
> > > possibly slow to start application will be launched. While I guess
> > > opening a new window is not a problem (the same happen for nautilus),
> > > the others are probably the reasons that makes unexpected downloads
> > > annoying.
> >
> > A progress bar or status bar seem to be what is needed.
> >
> > What bothers me about slow operations like launching a new application is
> > that if i had known in advance that a link was going to try and run an
> > external program I might not have clicked it in the first place and
> > secondly there is not always a way to break out of these long operations.
> > If a download or program launch is taking too long I should be able to say
> > 'nevermind' and cancel the operation.

a progress bar really helps and makes it much easier as the user will
better be able to quantify how long is _too long_

> > > This is what I'm more worried about. I cant think of any possible
> > > solution.
> > >
> > > Thanks for any feedback. I hope I gave enough details, if something is
> > > unclear please ask.
> >
> > It is late in the day
> > losing track of what I'm trying to say
>
> Wow, lots of interesting well thought ideas here. I used GetRight years
> ago, it seem it's much improved from that time, I'll give it another try
> soon. Do you mind if I forward this mail to epiphany devel list ?
> Thanks a lot Alan !

Glad my ideas were of interest, it makes my day.

I also pleasantly surprised I managed to write a whole email about web
browser without bemoaning the demise of Mozilla Seamonkey and my
frustration at Mozilla Firebird.  Ooops too late :P
Thank goodness for Epiphany.

Sincerely

Alan Horkan
http://advogato.org/person/AlanHorkan/

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