Would a reorganization apply to both KDE and GNOME desktop, then?
Yes. Exactly for the reasons you named, Tanja :-) By the way, a
reorganization of YaST control center already took place in SLES 10
SP1. This solution is similar to what Sigi and I suggested. Perhaps it
would be a good idea to take the YaST control center as it is in SLES
10 SP1, improve it a little and implement its design into all our
Feature changed by: Duncan Mac-Vicar
Feature #302306, revision 38
Title: Reorganization of YaST control center
openSUSE-10.3: Rejected by Stanislav Visnovsky
reject date: 2007-07-03 17:08:02
reject reason: Postponing, we are running out of time.
Priority
Requester: Mandatory
openSUSE-11.0: Rejected by Stanislav Visnovsky
reject date: 2008-04-25 15:09:31
reject reason: Needs more discussion.
Priority
Requester: Mandatory
Projectmanager: Important
openSUSE-11.1: Rejected by Federico Lucifredi
reject date: 2008-07-18 18:56:09
reject reason: postponing as per engineering's request.
Priority
Requester: Mandatory
Projectmanager: Important
openSUSE-11.2: New
Priority
Requester: Mandatory
Requested by: Martin Schmidkunz
+ Partner organization: openSUSE.org
Description:
As many users (even the experienced ones) find the current organization
of YaST modules confusing a reorganization is needed.
We have conducted a usability study where experienced users sorted the
YaST modules. So I would really ask to take advantage of these data.
You find the data and some thoughts about a possible re-categorization
on: http://en.opensuse.org/YaST_Control_Center_-_Card_Sort_Study
The reorganization would affect the sorting and presentation, some
labeling issues, the use of a consistent icon set, the use of tool tips
and an enhancment of search
One possible solution would be to organize it similar to the GNOME
configuration center:
I already heard that it might be mandatory to present AppArmor as an
extra section (which in my opinion would be not advisable from a
usability perspective, but if it is mandatory, then we have to add it
as an extra section).
I also thought that some YaST modules (e.g. keyboard, mouse, DNS,
Hostname) are doublicated but it turned out, that this makes sense for
SLES.
Still I suggest combining the modules "user management" and "group
management" into a single module called "User and Group Management".
This makes sense because opening "user management" and "group
management" opens the same module but only show a different view.
Documentation Impact:
This would require a lot of changes throughout the manuals.
Discussion:
#1: Tanja Roth (2007-05-30 14:33:36)
Would a reorganization apply to both KDE and GNOME desktop, then?
Whatever a new YaST structure would look like, from a doc perspective
it would be important that YaST structure and appearance are in sync
for both desktops as we strive to use a "common doc base" for both
desktops whereever possible to reduce efforts and costs.
As reorganization of YaST would require many changes throughout our
manuals, we cannot afford to additionally maintain different "flavors"
of YaST chapters for KDE/GNOME.
Apart from that, consistent structure and appearance of YaST in both
desktops would also be a benefit for users.
#2: Stanislav Visnovsky (2007-06-12 11:40:45)
Sigi, is the card study finished now? Where can we find the results?
#3: Martin Schmidkunz (2007-06-12 13:58:58)
products. What do you think about that?
#4: Stanislav Visnovsky (2007-06-12 14:00:46)
(reply to #3)
There was no reorganization for SLE10 SP1. The only change was
introduction of slab-based GNOME control center for YaST. The
categorization, description and module lists did not change and are
shared between KDE and GNOME control centers.
#5: Martin Schmidkunz (2007-06-12 18:01:19)
I am sorry for a missunderstanding. I meant that we should take the
current "GNOME control centre" - like design of the YaST control centre
in SLES 10 SP 1 as a base for a redesign of the YaST control centre in
our other products. Additionally to that, we should discuss (and
perform) a reorganization of modules.
#7: Federico Lucifredi (2007-06-29 17:59:43)
(reply to #5)
This is worth pursuing, I am no UX expert, but if we can make it easier
for users to find things, we should.
A reorganization should be well thought-out, so that we break the
existing habits *only once*, we should not be reshuffling things too
often.
#8: Siegfried Olschner (2007-07-03 12:
35:30)
The results of the the cardsort study are available at:
http://en.opensuse.org/YaST_Control_Center_-_Card_Sort_Study
The subjects (N=~30) have been "Experts", so you can transfer the
results to a new openSUSE YaST Control Center.
The cluster trees with 2 different statistical options show only one
difference: - ISDN, Modem, DSL, Network => Hardware - ISDN, Modem, DSL,
Network => Network see http://en.opensuse.org/YaST_Control_Center_-_Card_Sort_Study#Illustrative_Ma...
I'm just writing a sumary. This section is placed at the top of the page.
#9: Siegfried Olschner (2007-07-03 12:
39:23)
I got only 2-3 NOT-Expert users in the sample. Their results are not
presented on the page. But it's clear, they separated out cards like:
VLM, iSCSI Initiator, Powertweak, VNC, Sudo, AppArmor, LDAP, etc.,
etc.
#10: Siegfried Olschner (2007-07-06 10:
05:23)
Some mockups available at: http://en.opensuse.org/YaST_Control_Center_-_Card_Sort_Study#Sorting_and_pre...
#11: Martin Schmidkunz (2007-11-29 13:50:55)
Some additional mock ups and thoughs about that topic are available at:
http://en.opensuse.org/YaST/Development/New_Control_Center
#13: Martin Schmidkunz (2008-02-11 15:24:24)
One other suggestion was influenced by the KDE 4 control center: http://en.opensuse.org/YaST/Development/New_Control_Center/YaST_KDEstyle
The main concerns with these mock ups are:
* information overload
* "search" is somehow meaningless if it isn't provided by some kind of
thesaurus
#15: Berthold Gunreben (2008-04-09 12:52:12)
I don't know if this is just too late, but for me the only design that
looks like a real step forward from all the designs on
http://en.opensuse.org/YaST/Development/New_Control_Center/ is http://en.opensuse.org/YaST/Development/New_Control_Center/YaST_System_Navig...
I really like this approach.
Please don't just create huge lists of modules, or preselected lists of
modules that never can meet the customers needs.
#16: Duncan Mac-Vicar (2008-04-24 14:56:14)
This feature was on impl. But limited resources and refocus on
PackageKit froze development. Passing back to Stano.
#17: Federico Lucifredi (2008-06-13 19:49:56)
lets figure out a plan and get it done this time :)
#19: Federico Lucifredi (2008-07-18 18:55:46)
PM-Priority for product openSUSE-11.1 downgraded from mandatory to
important:
lowering as per engineering request.
#20: Martin Schmidkunz (2007-09-29 03:17:48)
As there is some negative feedback from the KDE 4 personal settings
menu (https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=431432), maybe we
should take it into account when talking about a YaST control center
redesign. BTW: what is the status on this feature request?
#21: Thomas Göttlicher (2008-10-23 17:03:56)
(reply to #20)
Thanks for this hint. Development on this featrue is postponed.
--
openSUSE Feature:
https://features.opensuse.org/?rm=feature_show&id=302306
