[aKregator-devel] usability review

[Frank O. <fra...@gm...>]

Hi folks, 

Eckhart Woerner sent me a usability review of akregator, he conducted with 
several people. Based on their feedback with own suggestions added, he 
created a report. Here's a translation, the original file (German) is 
attached. The translation is rough, an "express translation" so to say ;-)
First remarks I made are in [brackets]. Thanks to Eckhart, I think we can 
follow most of the suggestions. And most of them aren't even hard to 
implement. ;-)

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1. Quick search 
===============

If you change the folder, the quick search bar gets resetted. In Akregator the 
search text remains. That might confuse people because other folders suddenly 
appear empty (depending on the search term). 

The quick search combobox in KMail has an icon for every entry which makes the 
function more clear. Akregator's has not. 

A click on "clear filter" deletes the input widget, but doesn't reset the 
combobox. 

The "clear filter" area in KMail is bigger, so it's easier to hit it.

3. Tabs
=======

The behaviour and the naming of the close-button in tabs is different to 
konqueror. Konqueror displays the button instead of the favicon, akregator 
only on hover. Maybe the behaviour should get unified.

4. the article list
===================

The date of articles should be displayed like in KMail, e.g. "Yesterday 
12:00". 

It would be good if you could choose a time span after that an feed [fo: 
article?] gets marked as read. 

It should be possible to select multiple feeds [fo: articles?], e.g. for 
deletion.

5. folder and feed list
=======================

A RMB click on a folder shows a context menu with entries like "Edit feed", 
"delete feed" etc. Feed and Folder should be distinguished. [fo: done] 

An empty folder should not be expandable (no [+]-symbol). 

Deleting an empty folder (without feeds [fo: mails] or subfolders) shows "do 
you want to delete this /empty/ folder?". It eases the user knowing that the 
folder is really empty. 

The security check at folder deletion is without forced word-wrap. That makes 
reading easier. Emphasizing the folder name (bold) prevents that people read 
over the folder name. Forced word-wraps are needless.

6. "Add Feed" and "Add Folder"
==============================

The input widget in the "add feed" dialog is far too small. Since URLs are 
often long, it should be bigger. The input widget in the "add folder" dialog 
is bigger, even though folder names are usually shorter. 

The dialogs "add feed" and "add folder" are very different and hence 
complicate the handling. In the folder dialog there is a "clear" button, but 
not in the feed dialog. On the other hand, the feed dialog contains a symbol 
which mixes the dialog up [fo: I hope this translation makes any sense ;)]. 
For the folder dialog, a folder symbol would be appriopriate.

7. Further Suggestions
======================

Considering the increasing spread of Podcasts, an implementation of feed 
attachments (enclosures) would be desirable. These could look like mail 
attachments in KMail. Also check 
http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/enclosuresAggregators
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