Proposal for Seahorse inclusion in GNOME 2.18 http://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2006-September/msg00159.html
"Suggestions for how Seahorse can improve are welcome, as are ideas for making encryption easier for users. Taking a look at a recent seahorse release will help your comments that much more insightful" Seahorse screenshots http://www.gnome.org/projects/seahorse/screenshots.html Apologies in advance but I'm working off the screenshots to start with and I will try and get recent binaries or compile Seahorse later for more detailed feedback. The screenshots are not dated or marked with any version so I'll assume they are from the most recent release*. I figured I should take a quick look at Seahorse and provide feedback now rather than later (especially since I feel burned by some of the last minute changes made to Baobab supposedly in the name of HIG compliance but that is a rant for another time). I'm not an expert but I know what I like and I am familiar with the Human Interface Guidelines as well as the Documentation Style Guide (which is very relevant to the use of language in the interface). I do not see a grippy on the lower right corner which suggests you aren't using the standard status bar widget. The first dialog includes the following labels on the Tabs: "My Personal Keys" "Keys I trust" "Keys I've Collected" This kind of informality is out of keeping and inconsistent with the style of Gnome. Microsoft have even stated they will drop the "My" prefix in front of "My Documents" in their next release, about a decade overdue. I would encourage you to also avoid the "My" prefix. Abbreviations should generally be avoided to maintain maximum clarity. There is no benifit in trying to compact things ("I've") as you need to leave enough extra space for translations which may not be as terse as English. More appropriate labels would be: "Personal Keys" "Trusted Keys" "Collected Keys". The "Create a New Key" dialog has conflicting mnemonics, the same letter is used for both _Cancel and _Continue. (I cannot be sure from just a screenshot but Close might be a more pedantically correct label if there is no previous action needing to be cancelled.) I see a Tab heading labelled "Name/Signature" it would be preferable to pick one or the other or a different lable entirely to cover both concepts. Acronyms (and abbrevations) should generally be avoided to maintain maximum clarity. They obscure information that might otherwise inform and educate the user. Intelligent well educated people can be blocked out by acronyms by virtue of not knowing the jargon of your subject area but given the chance the full words would make much more sense. For example SSH is short for Secure Shell (SSH) and using the full words (possibly followed by the shortened form after it in brackets) give users a concept they can hold on to "Secure Shell" rather than a much more obtuse acronym. They still might not quite understand the shell part but at least they have a chance of gaining that little extra bit of understanding if you provide the information. Learnability. I hope to try out Seahorse soon and provide a more thorough review. Best of luck with getting Seahorse included in Gnome. Sincerely Alan Horkan Inkscape http://inkscape.org Abiword http://www.abisource.com Open Clip Art http://OpenClipArt.org Alan's Diary http://advogato.org/person/AlanHorkan/ * Okay so it is a slightly unfair assumption and wishful thinking but it sure would be nice if were true. _______________________________________________ Usability mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/usability
