Foldable toolbar - questionable usability

[Myriam Schweingruber]

Hi Nikolaj,

On Sun, Jun 28, 2009 at 22:30, Nikolaj Hald
Nielsen<nhnfreespirit at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I just saw in trunk that a change in the toolbars has arrived. The
>> toolbar under the playlist can now be "folded" (hidden) with an arrow.
>> The intention is noble (saving vertical space), but in reality we're
>> merely gaining about 40 pixels space from it, if you subtract the
>> height of the arrow widget itself. And if the toolbar is shown, we
>> actually lose space due to said arrow widget.
>>
>> I find it questionable if this minimal reduction of space is worth the
>> added confusion - it's not clear what the arrow is actually doing, and
>> where there toolbar went.
>>
>>
>> I've attached two screenshots of the new widget in both states, both
>> folded and unfolded.
>
> I added this precisely to start a discussion, so goal accomplished! :-) I
> had been talking to leinir about trying out something like this, and decided
> to commit it as it can be quite easily removed again. There are 2 main parts
> to it. One is the reduction in space. For small devices, and together with
> the new slimemr toolbar alternative (also a prototype) I also committed, the
> additional space gained in the playlist is quite significant.

Well, I can eventually understand this, but if I look at the shitty
screen resolution on the jukebox, it's gain is not that big and, to be
honest, it is confusing.
>
> The other, and in my opinion more significant reason to play with this stuff
> is to make the amarok interface simpler.

Well, as said above, personally I find it rather confusing, as the
folded bar just shows a green arrow with nothing that intuitively
tells you what it is there for. Also it very much breaks the symmetry
in my view, on both screen resolution. Mainly because that arrow is
green.

> My idea was also something like making this a standard interface element in
> amarok in all places where there are options like these at the bottom (in
> many services for instance). This would add symmetry (one of the main things
> Nuno hammered home at the sprint) and if consistently used, it would be
> clear to users that whereever this appeared, there would be additional
> options.

For the sake of consistency we would have to add such an arrow also to
the right view then. Currently I find it rather disturbing. Also, for
the users going to shovel around the various elements, there will not
be much symmetry left anyway, which buries that exact argument

I always thought that these green arrows were ugly anyway, and, when
used on a screen with transparency enabled, it's barely visible for
the widget dialog for example.



Regards, Myriam.

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