Re: [Evolution-hackers] Calendars and Tasks integration

[Ettore Perazzoli <ettore ximian com>]

On Mon, 2003-08-18 at 16:11, Anna Marie Dirks wrote:
> I am advocating a label + option menu for the "filter bar" thingy I
> described... not a full search bar by any stretch of the imagination.
> Are two widgets (label + option menu) really overkill? A label + option
> menu doesn't seem much more complex than a toolbar button at all. 

It's still more complicated than just a switch.  (BTW it could be
somewhere else, it doesn't need to be in the toolbar.  It would just be
a little "zoom" control for the task list.)

> I am really not sure that I understand your question. Are you asking
> how, in a filter bar, you'd pick a set of folders? Or are you asking
> which folders would appear in the filter bar, period? I'll assume the
> former..

Yep.  :)

> Well, if we went this route, then the summary of tasks in the calendar
> would be just that-- a summary. I don't necessarily think that we'd want
> or need to cram all of the same information/options into that summary as
> into the tasks component (or for that matter, into the calendar
> component). 

Indeed.  The little task pad is not supposed to be the full-featured
view of the tasks...  But it sounds like being able to filter the
categories/calendars for the tasks is a useful feature which we would
get for free if we went the integrated way.

[Usage scenarios]
> 1. I know that Tuesday is going to be an overloaded day for me, so I
> want to check what stuff I'm supposed to do on Tuesday, including
> appointments, meetings, and tasks. 

But you want to see all the tasks, or just the work tasks?  If you have
lots of both, you probably want to have your task view only include the
subset that makes sense for the calendar you are looking at.  So the
integrated setting would make your life easier.

> 3. I want to be prepared for the next Evo team meeting, so I'm trying to
> figure out what designs I'm supposed to have prepared by that time. 

Also in this case you really want to just see the Evolution tasks, not
all the tasks you have.  So how would you do it?

In the case where the calendar selection affects the task selection as
well, you select "Evolution" once (assuming you have an "Evolution"
calendar of course) and you are done.

In the case where they are separate settings, instead, you have to
select it twice (once with the nice large side bar, and once with the
more awkward option menu ;-)).  So I suspect it would be more handy if
you had it the other way.

Also: since in the new UI you get one integrated view for all of the
calendar (as opposed to switching between them), "multiple calendars"
actually ends up meaning "multiple categories".  And since calendars and
tasks are very closely related to each other, it makes sense that you
share the same set of categories...

-- Ettore