Widget Explorer usability problems

[Sebastian Kügler]

On Tuesday 12 January 2010 13:17:04 Sean wrote:
> Here is the idea for a new category UI design
> http://imagebin.ca/view/5yNh2p3.html

The categories really don't say anything about the purpose of an applet. Say I'm 
looking for a tool to take notes, where do I find this?

It would be good to base such categorization on the use cases AnnieC defined. this 
way it looks rather randomly, "because it fits horizontally". For a first-time user, 
the categories are even completely useless (and that's where we need discoverability 
the most, the second+-time users are more likely to use the search field.

> Simple, to the point and users know these from the Kicoff menu. Recommended
> could be widgets that are randomly recommended for use by us. Maybe track
> the users most used and randomly pick from it? It's mainly just a fill in
> for now really.
> 
> Here is a idea for a way to remove widgets and more than one of the same
> kind http://imagebin.ca/view/UaQTcxW.html

You introduce a third-level UI here, with really tiny buttons. Try to hit those with 
a crappy netbook touchpad (like mine has one), and you'll end up frustrated quickly.

Also, the metaphore of the button is completely unclear to me (what does it do? What 
happens when I click on the smaller triangle? The larger one? How do you fit a large 
enough font (>= smallestReadableFont) in there.

The UI there is really far from clear, and way worse than the in-context [x] on the 
applet handle.
-- 
sebas

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