Comments & questions abou Paroli UI design

[Risto H. Kurppa]

Hi!

Started using 2009&Paroli last week and wrote some comments about it
on the list [1], [2]. Interested more about Paroli and cleaned the
Paroli wiki page [3] and created a known issues/wishlist page [4]. As
Paroli & 2009 is the first set in my phone that Works as a (simple)
phone, I really want to push it forward to make it even better.

So anyway, now that I've been using Paroli for about a week I have
some questions about the UI. I suppose someone at OM designed the UI
that Mirko has implemented so I'd like to hear answers to some
questions and also suggest some changes (improvements, I hope).

I really like the simple design but it must be easy to use, too, for a
someone that steals my phone (or who I give my phone to :). On the
other hand I'd like it to be colourful, with background image and
everything but maybe that comes with the themes (if Paroli is
themeable?)

* For a new user it's a mess not knowing when to slide things sideways
and when to click on 'nothing' (=black area) to get to phonebook etc.
I think I'd like to see small arrows on top/bottom or left/right on
the screen when user can slide. Maybe this could be a 'beginners mode'
and then the 'advanced mode' turns them off?

* No colours (delete, recharge, adding name)

* When there's a screen to type in something, it should read what are
you typing in. Is it the name for a phonebook item, a SMS, WLAN
network password ...?

* Empty I/O shows an 'edit' button.. maybe it should be hidden and
instead a text 'no logged events' could be shown?

* There's nothing (no text/button) telling one should click in the
black area to get to phonebook to select recipient in 'msgs' -> '+' or
'Tele'

* No visual feedback of shutting down (bug #93)

* when not in fullscreen mode (=illume enabled), one can't see the
used profile in the home view -> is it intentional that the top bar of
Paroli doesn't show if running not-fullscreen?

* could the dial volume change (AUX during call) either have % char
with the number or a graphical scale. Now it's just a number, seeing
60 there doesn't tell you that it's 60% of the max 256 of Calypso..

* The screen now has (in some views) 4 fields: top bar, navigation bar
(next/previous), num view and the keypad.

*  SMS: There's no feedback after sending a message (bug #3)

*  The date doesn't need the | -bars in the home view: it's | Sunday,
May 10, 2009 | - the bars just make it more difficult to read

* renaming of I/O, Tele and Msgs in the menu (maybe to call log, SMS
and dialer?)

* The numbers in the home view showing missed calls or received
messages could be bigger/colorful/something or even say 'one missed
call' or 'new SMS received

* When shutting down Paroli the dialog asking to leave paroli in the
background has buttons aligned to bottom left. When getting the error
messages for failing with loading GSM&GPRS, the button is aligned in
the bottom center. Should they be aligned to the same place maybe?
Should the not look like E dialog but look more like the rest of
Paroli?

* Going back or closing apps doesn't always work the same: sometimes
there's the 'back' button and sometimes you have to press the top bar
to go back. It's not easy to understand why there's this difference.
And not easy to use as the top bar is hidden when using
non-fullscreen, and there's nothin indicating I should click on the
top bar to go back/close the app.

* http://www.paroli-project.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/people_edit_name.png
back has the arrow but next doesn't? why's this?

*There's propably more but let's start with this :)

And generally, what's the level of freedom the coders (Mirko) have,
from the GUI design point of view? Are there any GUI guidelines or
documents telling how the GUi should be made. Like if I want to write
an app to send my location to an internet service over GPRS, is there
a guide how should I position the buttons? How about a checkbox or a
radio button, are they OK to use in Paroli etc etc? Are these
documents available somewhere?


Thanks for Paroli, it's great! Let's make it even better!

r



[1] http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2009-May/047657.html
[2] http://lists.openmoko.org/pipermail/community/2009-May/047736.html
[3] http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Paroli
[4] http://wiki.openmoko.org/wiki/Paroli-issues

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