Originally for Qtopia, applicable to OZ

[Anonymous]

Hello!
I had originally written this for Qtopia based on my experience using various handhelds, but thought this would help the Open Source OZ community too.

(This mail was sent to Trolltech)

Hello!
I\'m a long time owner of the Sharp Zaurus running Qtopia.  Professionally, I\'m a software engineer with a personal interest in Human Computer Interaction.  
 
If you are wondering what this email is all about, that\'s what it is - feedback on Qtopia.  I have a Palm and a PocketPC along with the Zaurus.  I also do some programming with Qtopia.
 
I\'ll get straight to the point. Here\'s my observation on how to improve Qtopia from a Users\' perspective. I have a Zaurus C760 running tkcRom.  
 
Font:
Qtopia does a decent job on aesthetics.  It isn\'t as spectacular as OPIE but pretty decent.  Let me start with the overall looks.  I like the font.  Very decent but would be nice if it is a little bigger for a more comfortable feel.
 
 
StartBar/Menu:
The startbar at the bottom should remain where it is.  Most Users are used to window\'s default setup and would feeel at home with the current setup.  Users usually have resistance to change.  (law of human nature!).  In PocketPC, the StartBar is on the top.  Which according to me, isn\'t a very well thought of idea.  
 
The height of the startbar needs to be a lot bigger than what it is right now.  Remember, usability is not about how much information you can fit in a screen, but how you present them.  My first generation palm feels more comfortable than Qtopia or PPC.  
 
A rough size would be one and half of what each menu item in the startbar is.  PPC seem to have gotten this right.  The size is very \'comfortable\'.  Under Qtopia, it is small and you can see a lot more menu items, but is not very comfy from a User\'s perspective.
 
Applications Tab:
There could be more space between items in each tab.  The items could be a little bigger too.  The height of the tab should be a little bigger, maybe the same height as of the above suggested Startbar.  
 
ScrollBar:
Definitely has to be a lot thicker.  It is very uncomfortable.  
 
TitleBar:
The title bar of a dialog has to be a lot thicker.  Same height as the Startbar.  The Close/Minimize buttons, they are the worst.  Needs to be larger.  I like this in the PPC.  The height they chose seem to be perfect.  (Why?  Becauase it is not always a User uses the stylus to tap on the screen, most users tend to use the finger for quick actions like closing a dialog and a tiny button doesn\'t help.)
 
Default Action On Pressing Cancel:
The default action seems to be to close the application. It should be a confirmation dialog to close.  
 
Soft Keyboard:
Looks very slick compared to PPC or Palm, but highly unusable.  Again the emphasis seems to be to pack as many characters as possible in a small place.  This is not what a User wants.  Here are some tips on the KB layout:

Each key needs to be a lot bigger than what it is now.  In my old palm (res should be 190 pixels I think!), the kb took up almost half the screen, yet one never feels uncomfortable with it
Use a layout that has only chars along with (!, @, $, , , .?, -) (emails and shortcuts for \'and\'  used very commonly)  and use a  toggle key for numbers or and other chars. You don\'t need a seperate caps key.  The shift can serve as a toggled caps.  And why two shift keys in a soft keyboard?  With one hand using the stylus and one hand to hold the pda, what is the need for a second shift key?  Soft keyboards need not mimic the actual keyboard.  The layout needs to be with Users comfort in mind.
The same goes for alts and ctrls, why two?  Instead make each button a lot bigger than it is now.  

Handwriting:
I\'ve given a lot of emphasis on the keyboard usage because the h/w tool is practically unusable.  I can\'t give much input on this since this is not exactly my area of expertise.  Again, you need not have a excellent recognition like the Newton or PPC, but a rudimentary recognition like Palms old Graffiti would do just fine.  Again, if Qtopia could allow writing anywhere on the screen like the current Palms and PPC, that\'ll be great.  But good recognition is very essential than that.  
 
Cut/Copy/Paste:
Tap and Hold should be a default functionality on all editbox controls with Cut/Copy/Paste/Select All as options.  This is sooo very essential considering on a PDA Users don\'t like to type a lot no matter how easy the data entry method is.
 
Tap And Hold Balloon Help(tooltips):
This would be a nice addition
 
Splitter:
Being a developer, I realize the splitter control is missing.  This is so necessary for a handheld environment.  I don\'t see why this is difficult since it is already there in a say, a grid control, you can resize the columns or a CSS/frames in NetFront browser.
 
Minimize Button:
A minimize button would be nice.  It should put the app in b/g and bring the last app to the front.  This also would mimic the desktop feel.
 
Qtopia Desktop:
Trolltech seriously needs some good GUI designers.  It does not look professional.  It need not have eye candys but should atleast look as decent as the first Palm Desktop with no frills but well written application.
 
Sync:
Fix the Sync.  This is so vital.  Make sure it syncs right the first time everytime.  This simply has to work.  The PIMs need to be improved along with Outlook sync.
 
Software Installation:
It would be nice if apps can be packaged as a win installation file which would also install the app on the pda on the next sync.  Most PPC apps are like this and of late even Palm is doing this.  I have to agree, I feel much more comfortable installing an app like that instead of dragging it into the doc folder.  How about Linux users?  Frankly, I have nothing against Linux, but from a business perspective, it makes more sense to keep the Windows users more comfortable.  
 
 
Conclusion:
Qtopia seems to be the most intuitive UI on a handheld.  (The palm is the most comfortable, but not necessarily intuitive).  You might\'ve noticed my emphasis on mimicking the desktop.  Not because MS came with the best desktop setup(MS\'s setup isn\'t very good actually), but because people have been trained on that an it is better to stick to this for Users to feel comfy.  Incidently, MS seemed to have broken this rule by putting the Startbar up and tabs at the bottom on their PPC platform.  PPC gets my lowest marks on intuitiveness.
 
Of course, what Trolltech does with these observations is upto Trolltech!  I really like this platform and believe it has a lot of potential especially in the smartphone space (there is a lot of money there).  In terms of functionality Qtopia seems to have a head start compared to Win Mobile or Palm.  If the above points can be addressed, the User experience in my opinion would be a lot more pleasant.
 
Thanks for your time!

[zbones]

I\'m sorry, but I have to disagree with your comments on resizing the menu objects.

If you increased the size of all the items you mentioned this would really cut down on the application area.

Also, some of the apps already written (sadly) use pre-set screen designs and do not auto fit to the screen.  These apps would either have to be re-designed or would have part of them not visible to the user, this in some cases would force a scrollbar to appear,  and in others render the app useless, ie if an important button/output box was forced of the bottom underneath the status bar.

I would rather them be smaller. I use \"hotkeys\" to switch and load applications anyway.

Any program I use that has a \"fullscreen\" option ends up running fullscreen.

Perhaps make the customizeable, you could make them bigger, I could make them smaller. Everybodies happy   It may also force more people to write apps that resize themselves on the fly, and not hard code them.

Default Action On Pressing Cancel:  

Again, I disagree here also.  Speed is important to me, if I didn\'t want to exit the app I wouldn\'t press cancel. I don\'t need an \"are you sure?\" box, they just waste time and annoy me.  It\'s one of my biggest bugbears with windows.  You want to delete a folder, and are faced with 20 questions.  \"This folder contains read only items, really delete?\"  This folder contains executable files...\", \"This folder contains hidden/system files..\" and so on ad nauseum.  I prefer rm -rf foldername, and poof, it\'s gone, just like you intended.

I don\'t use the hw or popup keyboard, The hardware keyboard will always be quicker for input as you can use more than one hand/finger

Cut/Copy/Paste:

This I do agree with, although may apps allow you to use ctrl-c and ctrl-v which is even quicker.

Minimize Button:  

You don\'t need one.  press the home key to minimise and return the desktop, or click on the icon in the taskbar to switch, or use \"hotkeys\" to switch.

Software Installation:

I don\'t tend to install apps from a PC, It\'s much easier to install them directly onto the zaurus.  Most people want to remove dependencies on Microsoft products, not increase them.

Sync:  

Agreed, also make it sync with linux.

Nothing Personal, we all have our opinions, it\'s just that mine are different to yours.

Peter.

[lpotter]

hmm. when/where did you send this to TT? email it to me, and I will pass it on.