Om2009 testing release 4

Risto H. Kurppa risto at kurppa.fi
Wed May 27 07:57:50 CEST 2009


On Mon, May 25, 2009 at 1:25 PM, Mirko Lindner <mirko at openmoko.com> wrote:
>> 2d) There is too much latency between pressing the AUX button during a
>> call and any indication that the system is working on changing the
>> volume.  Ideally, what I'd like the GUI to show me is not what the
>> current volume is, but what it will be once it has finished processing
>> all the button presses.
>
> This is an issue happening in several places in paroli. The interface is
> very honest in the sense that it only shows what actually happened. Of
> course this means that changes are visible a bit later than in other
> interfaces. Should this paradigm be changed?

After I read this about 2 days ago, I've been thinking about it and
the conclusion is that yes, I think it should be changed.

I appreciate it that the UI shows me what's happening, as you said
'being honest'. But as soon as Paroli & everything behind it are
stable enough that we can trust that clicking a button does what we
want it to do, I think the UI should make the change as soon as
possible and do the actual work ASAP after this. This applies to
pressing AUX to change the profile, starting/disconnecting a call etc
etc:

Here's a usercase where the different approaches have been compared
(action first, then UI vs. UI first then action)
0s. user presses the AUX button to change the profile from 'silent' to 'default'
0.5s. Paroli works on the the change, no UI reaction vs. Text changed
from 'silent' to 'default'
1s. Text changes from 'silent' to 'default' vs. Paroli works on the
profile change & the user puts the phone in the pocket
1.5s user puts the phone in the pocket vs. user takes another sip of
his Dr. Pepper

In addition to this, in some situations one could add to 0.5s: 'user
presses AUX again since there was no response when he first pressed
it'

-> I think that immediate UI reaction gives the user the experience of
responsiviness and that the phone works faster. The same goes with
start/disconnect a call, loading Paroli & contacts&SMS from SIM etc.
Since the user is often slow, we should allow him to start thinking of
his next move as soon as possible and during that time do other stuff.

Concerning this, I'd like to see a 'busy' light/icon/something to
point out that work is being done, wait until it's finished before you
try anything else. The icon would be shown when the processor load is
90% or more. This would again give the user a better experience of
'we're doing stuff for you' instead of 'hmm.. I wonder if this crashed
since it doesn't react to my actions...'


r


-- 
| risto h. kurppa
| risto at kurppa dot fi
| http://risto.kurppa.fi




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