[Kexi-devel] KDE (vs GNOME) - Use Case

[Jarosław Staniek]

Robert Knight said the following, On 2005-11-14 00:44:

>>In Kexi, database app, there is a plan to impleemnt two user levels (1st:
>>normal==default and 2nd: advanced) mostly because of database-related issues
>>can be hidden from user's eyes.
> 
> 
> One of the problems that has already been mentioned is that users may
> want "advanced" level functionality in one area and "simple"
> functionality in another.  This might not reflect ability either, I
> often turn off 'advanced information' in applications simply because I
> don't want to see it as it gets in the way.
> 
> Looking at how Microsoft handle this in Windows Explorer, they provide
> options of "simple" or "advanced" on a per dialog / per feature basis,
> rather than forcing the user to run the whole program in "Beginner" or
> "Advanced" mode.  For example, this means that you can set to show
> file extensions (which might be considered 'Advanced' mode), but only
> show two options for file sharing and security (simple mode == Faster
> to configure for most purposes).
> 
> In the use case you just mentioned, advanced users have the extra
> hassle of entering both ID and Caption.  Why not unify both of these
> modes by allowing the user to enter a caption, upon doing this Kexi
> will suggest a latin1 name to use internally for the table.  More
> experienced users can then customise it if it does not meet their
> needs, while others can just accept the default suggested name.

AH, sorry for not mentioning this, but it's already implemented:

http://iidea.pl/~js/kexi/shots/0.9/object_save_as.png

The isse is that I wanted to hide name field completely, so Kexi can behave
more like competiting apps.

BTW, These usually have no such problem because they only work with specific,
internal database engine which handles unicode names internally. For Kexi it's
important not to create awfully named objects (tables and so on) if not needed
- that's why I need the config option.

> I suppose the primary reason I don't like the idea of "user levels" is
> because it could end up with developers having to design two different
> interfaces, neither of which will get as well tested as a result. 
> "Beginners" get a user interface which is too simplistic to perform
> various tasks, and "Advanced" users get a user interface which is
> overly complex and difficult to work with.  Either way, the user's
> productivity is lowered.  It also seems like a cop-out from designing
> a single well-thought out user interface, which can benefit newcomers
> and experts.  If the needs of a "beginner" and an "advanced user" are
> really very, very different, then why not make two separate
> applications.  eg. KEdit and Kate.

Yeah. I'd add that "very advanced needs" can be covered by providing
scriptable interface.

-- 
regards / pozdrawiam,
  Jaroslaw Staniek / OpenOffice Polska
  Kexi Developer:
      http://www.kexi-project.org | http://koffice.org/kexi
  Kexi support:
      http://www.kexi-project.org/support.html
  KDE3, KDE4 libraries for developing MS Windows applications:
      http://wiki.kde.org/tiki-index.php?page=KDElibs+for+win32