Communication about the new Partitioner UI
As likely everybody in this list knows, we changed the user interface of the Partitioner because it was impossible to add more functionality to the previous havoc of (dis)appearing menu-buttons. The changes were summarized in the description of this pull request that was then linked in our usual blog posts: https://github.com/yast/yast-storage-ng/pull/1157 The point is that we are getting quite some bug reports from people who didn't expect the change and who cannot find their way through the new UI. That includes people claiming the Partitioner is not longer displaying the partitions (because they are now nested in the tables within their corresponding disk) or claiming than a given options has disappeared (because it has been moved to the new menu). That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions: 1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general? 2) What can we do to communicate the change better to all possible users? The Partitioner is not the only part of YaST under heavy revamping, so whatever are the answers I expect them to be useful in general for YaST. Cheers. -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Linux GmbH
On 2/1/21 12:15 PM, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
[...]
That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions:
1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general?
2) What can we do to communicate the change better to all possible users?
The "all possible users" is a pretty important part here. We discussed the UI changes quite openly during implementation and they should not come as a surprise to people following the Factory mailing list or our blog posts. But that's a very small subset of all the (open)SUSE users. We need to reach all openSUSE users (maybe news.opensuse.org is the way for that) and all SLE users (maybe linking to that article or to any other from the release notes). Should we consider something beyond writing a blog post and linking to it? Maybe some video? If we do a video or something similar. Should it really be about the differences with the classic UI or should we just do a general presentation of all the YaST Partitioner functionality, just like if it was new? I think the latter would be more useful. Maybe we should ask for help from other (open)SUSE teams, like documentation or marketing. Cheers. -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Linux GmbH
On Mon, 2021-02-01 at 12:31 +0100, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
On 2/1/21 12:15 PM, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
[...] Should we consider something beyond writing a blog post and linking to it? Maybe some video?
If we do a video or something similar. Should it really be about the differences with the classic UI or should we just do a general presentation of all the YaST Partitioner functionality, just like if it was new? I think the latter would be more useful.
I agree, the latter would be better.
Maybe we should ask for help from other (open)SUSE teams, like documentation or marketing.
Cheers.
-- -- David Díaz YaST Team at SUSE LINUX GmbH IRC: dgdavid
On 2/1/21 12:15 PM, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
[...]
That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions:
1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general?
In this regard, maybe we should reconsider the approach of our current help texts in the Partitioner. When the users clicks on "help" they get a description about the content of the particular table that is currently on the screen and about the columns it contains. That's for sure useful but there is no general explanation, in the Help button or anywhere else, about how the whole Partitioner UI is organized. Nothing mentions the menu or the left tree. No way to get a general overview on how to navigate the UI. Or maybe all that is irrelevant because nobody uses the help anyways. I don't know. Or maybe we could have such explanation accessible through a different more prominent button than the Help one (which I feel has become part of the general landscape and nobody sees it anymore)... I don't know, I have more questions than answers here. ;-) Cheers -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Linux GmbH
On 2/1/21 12:48 PM, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
On 2/1/21 12:15 PM, Ancor Gonzalez Sosa wrote:
[...]
That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions:
1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general?
In this regard, maybe we should reconsider the approach of our current help texts in the Partitioner. When the users clicks on "help" they get a description about the content of the particular table that is currently on the screen and about the columns it contains. That's for sure useful but there is no general explanation, in the Help button or anywhere else, about how the whole Partitioner UI is organized. Nothing mentions the menu or the left tree. No way to get a general overview on how to navigate the UI.
I tried to fix that with new help texts. Please check and provide feedback https://github.com/yast/yast-storage-ng/pull/1208
Or maybe all that is irrelevant because nobody uses the help anyways. I don't know.
Or maybe we could have such explanation accessible through a different more prominent button than the Help one (which I feel has become part of the general landscape and nobody sees it anymore)...
I have been playing with the idea of a more powerful help dialog that can contain hyperlinks to additional content (like a "guided tour") or similar fancy stuff. But I discarded it for the time being. See the thread "The YaST Wizard and the help pop-up" in this same ML. https://lists.opensuse.org/archives/list/yast-devel@lists.opensuse.org/threa... Cheers. -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Software Solutions
Am Mo, 1. Feb, 2021 um 12:15 P. M. schrieb Ancor Gonzalez Sosa <ancor@suse.de>:
That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions:
1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general?
I really think the new UI is an improvement, however I do have a few small gripes I guess: * I don't really see the value of "All Devices" view, the sidebar does its job there * In case a user has only one device, why not automatically select it as the main view * It's impossible to tell the disks apart in the sidebar: users recognize their disks by the size and the disk make/manufacturer, not by a randomly assigned drive letter, and a sub suggestion to that: * I know 2 lines instead of one there may be controversial, but also maybe think about it, since it could make it more readable if implemented correctly (though a nightmare for people with hundreds of disks, view option?) * Does it make sense to show the disk itself in the view if an user has selected a disk in a sidebar already (this may break with context menubar stuff?) * Does the user have to go to the $device-type view (where $device-type is raid, lvm, bcache, etc.) to add the type of device, maybe it would be better if the sidebar had "Add $device_type" if there are 0 of a given type of device (add device on the menubar? add device under the sidebar?) * The $device_type name in the sidebar is a title, it would make sense for it to be relatively small, which icons definitely break, maybe it would be wiser to have icon on the devices and not the titles of the groups to make them stand out better
2) What can we do to communicate the change better to all possible users?
https://github.com/openSUSE/news-o-o is fairly easy to contribute to, considering yast.opensuse.org works more or less the same way ;)
The Partitioner is not the only part of YaST under heavy revamping, so whatever are the answers I expect them to be useful in general for YaST.
It is a big change and it's very appreciated all things considered, I may want to make some changes to how things look now though to make it better looking beyond just UX changes ;) LCP [Sasi] https://lcp.world
On 2/1/21 2:34 PM, Sasi Olin wrote:
Am Mo, 1. Feb, 2021 um 12:15 P. M. schrieb Ancor Gonzalez Sosa <ancor@suse.de>:
That opens a question - what can we do to prevent our users to get lost in the new UI? For me, that actually splits in two questions:
1) What can we adjust in the UI to make the transition smoother and/or to improve usability in general?
I really think the new UI is an improvement, however I do have a few small gripes I guess: * I don't really see the value of "All Devices" view, the sidebar does its job there
We have discussed that several times and we decided to keep it for "backwards compatibility". That is, not changing too much at a time. We could indeed consider killing the "All Devices" entry of the tree or maybe just killing the tree and replacing it with some kind of filter. But all that seemed like going too far in just one iteration. Let's say that would be phase 2. ;-)
* In case a user has only one device, why not automatically select it as the main view * It's impossible to tell the disks apart in the sidebar: users recognize their disks by the size and the disk make/manufacturer, not by a randomly assigned drive letter, and a sub suggestion to that: * I know 2 lines instead of one there may be controversial, but also maybe think about it, since it could make it more readable if implemented correctly (though a nightmare for people with hundreds of disks, view option?)
Good point.
* Does it make sense to show the disk itself in the view if an user has selected a disk in a sidebar already (this may break with context menubar stuff?)
That was a conscious decision that actually brings a lot of consistency to the whole UI. It may not be obvious at first, but try to kill that first line and then come up with an organization of the menus that makes obvious sense in all situations. It's not so easy. Moreover, that first line serves as some kind of "title" to give context to the whole list of partitions. That approach also ensures partitions are always displayed as nested elements of the disk and never as stand-alone elements. That also improves consistency a lot. And last but not least, that first line saves the users from too much jumping in the UI if they want to find actions that affect the whole disk.
* Does the user have to go to the $device-type view (where $device-type is raid, lvm, bcache, etc.) to add the type of device, maybe it would be better if the sidebar had "Add $device_type" if there are 0 of a given type of device (add device on the menubar? add device under the sidebar?)
Actually that's one of the problems that are solved by this new UI. Is not needed anymore to go to the RAID section to create a RAID. The Add menu is always there and it always allows to create a RAID, LVM, bcache, etc. No matter in which screen you currently are. We just kept the corresponding (now redundant) "Add Whatever" buttons on each section for backwards compatibility because we assumed some users would report a bug if they didn't find them there.
* The $device_type name in the sidebar is a title, it would make sense for it to be relatively small, which icons definitely break, maybe it would be wiser to have icon on the devices and not the titles of the groups to make them stand out better
Maybe. This goes again to the sidebar (or filter) discussion we want to have in the future, after the users are finally used to use the menu and the nested tables. Phase 2, do you remember? ;-)
2) What can we do to communicate the change better to all possible users?
https://github.com/openSUSE/news-o-o is fairly easy to contribute to, considering yast.opensuse.org works more or less the same way ;)
Sure, getting the content there will not be any problem if we agree that's the way to go.
The Partitioner is not the only part of YaST under heavy revamping, so whatever are the answers I expect them to be useful in general for YaST.
It is a big change and it's very appreciated all things considered, I may want to make some changes to how things look now though to make it better looking beyond just UX changes ;)
Cool! Cheers. -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Linux GmbH
As likely everybody in this list knows, we changed the user interface of the Partitioner... The openSUSE installation expert partitioner /was/ highly agreeable to me. The only things I found lacking were [1], and Mandrake/Mandriva/Mageia's installer cmdline option that limits its partitioner to only accepting designation of mount
Ancor Gonzalez Sosa composed on 2021-02-01 12:15 (UTC+0100): points, mount options, and whether to reformat any existing partition; powerless to alter, add or remove any partition. Nothing about the changes I noticed in the 20210210 15.3 DVD installation installer's expert partitioner do I prefer to what was. Very much missed are the instantly available at the bottom left: summary and settings, where I would always change mounting default to by LABEL and type to EXT4, and double check before proceeding from partitioning to next step that I made no serious typos or omissions. I loath having to choose to click a back button, which in the past more than once has caused all my work to that point to be discarded. Also missed is ability to see all partitions on all SATA and NVME disks at once, while excluding the installation USB partitions not to be considered for the to-be-installed system. [1] https://bugzilla.opensuse.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1101756 seems not to have been addressed, bad for multibooters. OT: At the very least, give some contrast to the bottom right buttons. Gray on off-white is merely bothersome. Off-white on pale green is very poor. The green is so pale that black would be better than pure white. It looks as if its contrast has been reduced as often happens when some other action is required before it can be selected. I don't like how deep I have to go into network configuration to setup static when all the static IP settings have already been provided via installer cmdline options. -- Evolution as taught in public schools, like religion, is based on faith, not on science. Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks! Felix Miata *** http://fm.no-ip.com/
On 2/22/21 7:36 AM, Felix Miata wrote:
Ancor Gonzalez Sosa composed on 2021-02-01 12:15 (UTC+0100):
[...]
Very much missed are the instantly available at the bottom left: summary and settings, where I would always change mounting default to by LABEL and type to EXT4, and double check before proceeding from partitioning to next step that I made no serious typos or omissions. I loath having to choose to click a back button, which in the past more than once has caused all my work to that point to be discarded.
I don't get the part about pressing a back button here. Now both "Settings" and "Installation Summary" are displayed with a pop-up dialog that is closed with an ok button. No back button involved.
[...] OT: At the very least, give some contrast to the bottom right buttons. Gray on off-white is merely bothersome. Off-white on pale green is very poor. The green is so pale that black would be better than pure white. It looks as if its contrast has been reduced as often happens when some other action is required before it can be selected.
For changes in the installer theming I guess it would be better to reach out to LCP or maybe some other mailing list, but I'm not sure which one. -- Ancor González Sosa YaST Team at SUSE Software Solutions
On 2/22/21 6:36 AM, Felix Miata wrote:
Ancor Gonzalez Sosa composed on 2021-02-01 12:15 (UTC+0100):
As likely everybody in this list knows, we changed the user interface of the Partitioner... The openSUSE installation expert partitioner /was/ highly agreeable to me. The only things I found lacking were [1], and Mandrake/Mandriva/Mageia's installer cmdline option that limits its partitioner to only accepting designation of mount points, mount options, and whether to reformat any existing partition; powerless to alter, add or remove any partition.
Nothing about the changes I noticed in the 20210210 15.3 DVD installation installer's expert partitioner do I prefer to what was.
Very much missed are the instantly available at the bottom left: summary and settings, where I would always change mounting default to by LABEL and type to EXT4, and double check before proceeding from partitioning to next step that I
Those options are now placed in the new menu bar at top: * View -> Settings * View -> Installation Summary
made no serious typos or omissions. I loath having to choose to click a back button, which in the past more than once has caused all my work to that point to be discarded. Also missed is ability to see all partitions on all SATA and NVME disks at once, while excluding the installation USB partitions not to be considered for the to-be-installed system.
I think you can see all partitions at once when you select "Hard Disks" or even "All Devices" on the left tree. Maybe the partitions are collapsed in the table? We are improving the criteria to auto-collapse entries.
[1] https://bugzilla.opensuse.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1101756 seems not to have been addressed, bad for multibooters.
OT: At the very least, give some contrast to the bottom right buttons. Gray on off-white is merely bothersome. Off-white on pale green is very poor. The green is so pale that black would be better than pure white. It looks as if its contrast has been reduced as often happens when some other action is required before it can be selected.
I don't like how deep I have to go into network configuration to setup static when all the static IP settings have already been provided via installer cmdline options.
Thanks for your feedback. We will take it into account. Iván -- José Iván López González YaST Team at SUSE LINUX GmbH IRC: jilopez
participants (5)
-
Ancor Gonzalez Sosa -
David Díaz -
Felix Miata -
José Iván López González -
Sasi Olin