[referencer] usability regressions

[John Spray]

(I'm doing my periodic round of "oops, I never replied to that email...")

If you're still interested, please go ahead and implement tag-dragging, it
would be nice.

John

On Mon, May 4, 2009 at 2:32 PM, Henry Gomersall <whg21 at cam.ac.uk> wrote:

> Having used Referencer for some time now, I have noticed a couple of
> usability regressions appear in recent versions.
>
> The first is the default edit mode, where one can edit metadata in the
> list view. This disallows, what I would argue, is the more common usage
> of using Referencer as a means of organising commonly accessed papers.
> Ie, edit once, view many. For this reason the emphasis should be placed
> on easy opening, not on easy editing. Triple click is not a discoverable
> way of opening documents (i stumbled upon it accidentally!). Allowing
> editing in list view is also inconsistent with disallowing it in icon
> view. Further to this, the open action should follow the desktop default
> if possible; e.g. look up the /apps/nautilus/preferences/click_policy
> key to get whether single click opening is required. This is a good
> example of where single click is simply unused at the moment (which is
> crazy, as its the most basic mouse entry method!).
>
> The second regression is the loss of the tag check-box pane. Now adding
> tags to an entry in list view requires 2 extra clicks per tag (and
> discoverability is broken). The power of Referencer is in its tags and
> so hiding the tag attachment is a loss. Perhaps this could be somehow
> combined with the visible tag list (in F-Spot, tags can be dragged onto
> the item to be tagged). The little mouse-over icons in icon view are
> neat (but I think should not disappear after selecting a tag - allowing
> multiple tagging at once).
>
> Finally, instant apply would be a very useful feature. I have often
> added papers and exited only to open Referencer again and realised they
> are no longer present in my list.
>
> I would be happy to get involved in development efforts.
>
> Other than the above gripes, I think referencer is a great piece of
> software!
>
> Thanks,
>
> Henry
>
> _______________________________________________
> referencer mailing list
> referencer at icculus.org
> http://icculus.org/mailman/listinfo/referencer
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://icculus.org/pipermail/referencer/attachments/20090802/549ebc17/attachment.htm>