Fwd: Layout Customizer Keyboard Interaction

[Allison Bloodworth]

Hi Anastasia & Michelle,

After reviewing the Layout Customizer at: http://build.fluidproject.org/sakai-imagegallery-tool/sample-code/reorderer/portal/portal.html 
, we had a little designer pow-wow over email today in an effort to  
get our thoughts together before we sent any new instructions to you  
guys. :) Based on that discussion, we have two changes/suggestions for  
the Layout Customizer design/implementation:

1) Please change the "This box cannot be placed any higher in this  
column" message to "This box cannot be placed above a locked box." We  
will definitely test the understandability of this phrase with users  
in usability testing.
2) There seems to be a bug with this message appearing in a situation  
where we'd prefer it not appear. You may just still be working on this  
but we thought we'd let you know just in case. If you drag the portlet  
in the upper-right hand side to the upper left, trying to put it above  
the locked portlet, you (properly) get a warning message. However,  
when you then immediately drag it over the upper right portlet without  
letting go of your mouse in between (so that it moves to the top right  
position) you *still* see the message, but we'd prefer that you don't.  
In that situation, it should disappear when the portlet is dragged  
back into the right-hand column since there is no locked portlet there.

Also, in playing around with it just now I saw the problem Herb  
experienced, and I agree with him that having the "This portlet may  
not be/this box may not be..." message appear when your portlet hasn't  
even moved at least halfway into the column the message is referring  
to is confusing, and like his suggestion that it not appear until at  
least 60% of the portlet is in that column. And conversely, the  
message should disappear in exactly the same place when moving out of  
that column (which gives some guidance for when it should disappear in  
#2 above). I almost think the moving portlet should be even a bit  
farther (e.g. 80%?) into the target column before the message appears,  
but we can also test this.

Finally, I also just wanted to mention that I personally experienced  
some weird flashing and resultant difficulty in moving portlets around  
today. I believe the portlet would really quickly flash back and forth  
between different drop areas. I wasn't able to recreate it just now,  
but wondered if it could have something to do with moving your cursor  
(quickly) back and forth through two different drop areas as you are  
dragging your portlet?

Thanks so much, and let us know if you have any questions!
Allison

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Daphne Ogle <daphne at media.berkeley.edu>
> Date: May 29, 2008 1:45:58 PM PDT
> To: Gary Thompson <gary at unicon.net>
> Cc: erin yu <erin.yu at utoronto.ca>, Allison Bloodworth <abloodworth at berkeley.edu 
> >
> Subject: Re: Layout Customizer Keyboard Interaction
>
> Agree on all counts.  The message persisting sounds like a bug to  
> me.  My guess is that isn't on purpose.
>
> -Daphne
>
> On May 29, 2008, at 11:57 AM, Gary Thompson wrote:
>
>> Agreed.
>>
>> erin yu wrote:
>>> I agree, we should be consistent when display the warning message.
>>>
>>> Changing the message to "This box cannot be placed above a locked  
>>> box" and only displaying it when you drag a portlet over the  
>>> locked one sounds good to me.
>>> This is also because we don't display warning msgs when they try  
>>> to move a bottom portlet further down, a portlet on the right  
>>> column further right, etc.
>>>
>>> Erin
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 29-May-08, at 2:17 PM, Allison Bloodworth wrote:
>>>> Hey guys,
>>>> When looking at the portlet layout manager today I noticed a  
>>>> small inconsistency. 1) When you move a portlet  that is under  
>>>> the top right portlet to the top of the right column, even if you  
>>>> drag it very high you don't get a "this portlet cannot be moved  
>>>> any higher in this column" message. 2) If you drag the that same  
>>>> portlet to the upper left, trying to put it above a locked  
>>>> portlet, you do get that message. 3) However, when you then drag  
>>>> it over the upper right portlet (so that it moves to the top  
>>>> right position) right after you've dragged it to the upper-left  
>>>> (e.g. you haven't let go of the mouse) you *still* see the  
>>>> message. I don't think you should see it in that situation since  
>>>> in situation #1 you don't see the message.
>>>>
>>>> What do you guys think? Thought it might be easier to get our  
>>>> thoughts straight as a group before sending out to fluid-work and  
>>>> confusing the implementors. :)
>>>>
>>>> Also, perhaps Gary & Erin you can weigh in on changing the  
>>>> message about moving a portlet above a locked portlet? (E.g.  
>>>> "This box cannot be placed above a locked box" )
>>>>
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Allison
>>>
>
> Daphne Ogle
> Senior Interaction Designer
> University of California, Berkeley
> Educational Technology Services
> daphne at media.berkeley.edu
> cell (510)847-0308
>
>
>

Allison Bloodworth
Senior User Interaction Designer
Educational Technology Services
University of California, Berkeley
(415) 377-8243
abloodworth at berkeley.edu




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