So how would this system allow for easy locatability of roughly drafted memo's that are destined for final stamping processes at a later date to convert them into emails, inserting into documents, and the like? 

By providing a separate frame for memos, Tasks, Email, Datebook,  (and in longer term future, for Writer docs), stamping functions could be ridiculously simple.  All the roughly captured notes would be lined up in the memo frame automatically, and the user just has to go there and drag and drop the items into the final destined frame for stamping processes.  Fish eye system outlined previously on this thread would make such crucially important activities in a PIM unneccessarily complicated and as such, would probably end up being used very little or not at all for some users. Users would have to go looking back and forth through all the collections for their roughly captured memo's scattered everywhere and then go through some unncessary complex button system to stamp the memo's into emails, etc.  This then also entails the addition of a stamping menu bar to futher complicate the user interface.

Fish eye should be thrown on the scrap heap pronto IMO.  No point in wasting time with this nonsense.  JMHO.  Sorry to be blunt but it would a waste of developer time and resources as it does not parallel real life PIM activities.  If one really insisted on proceeding with this, then it should be just offered as one optional configuration setting that the user could select.  User preferences patterns later be surveyed and, depending on user pattern data, we might decide whether it would be worthwhile continueing development on this.  My guess is that it would probably be used very little compared to a multi-framed Dashboard design option.

The main weakness of the framed model for Dashboard as I had described previously is the lack of display of collections on the first level window.  However, if the user's monitor is large enough, then they may be allowed to include a frame for displaying collections of a  selected item within Dashboard level 1 as well. 

For those with smaller monitor screens, it would still be pretty easy to access the collections side bar view by simply double clicking an item from any of the frames into a second level Dashboard window with the more typical layout where collections are presented on the left sidebar.  The fact that an item within a frame on Dashboard's level 1 view may be part of a collection may be indicated by a "collections icon" embeded within the item's title bar. (ex. a small green Cactus symbol). 

The other main weakness of the framed model fo Dashboard as I had described previously is that each member of a collection would have it's own entry within Dashboard which may make it look like there are more items on Dashboard overall than there should be if thinking in terms of projects.  One way around this issue is to include only the lead items of collections within Dashboard.  For example, a lead item mignt be "Meeting with boss on project progress update".  Other items within the group.  Hence, users wil need to designate a lead item fo all collections and since collections are organized bits of data, this should not be too dificult to do.  To access the other members of the collection, the user simply needs to douple click the item within the frame and this could then explode another window on top which shows the collection the item belongs to, including the individual triage status colors of each item's title bar within the collection.

The fish eye view, in my opinion, looks fancy but will significantly limit usability of Chandler in day to day office life.  It just doesn't represent the way most people work IMO.

Sorry to be so blunt but when a fish stinks, it's pretty hard to ignore the smell.

I do appreciate the author's innovatively new design as it does have aesthetic appeal and I would encourage more model proposals like this as it gets us all to think in new paradigms. However, unfortunately, as it stands now, it fails miserably in providing a basic foundation for further replicating the most useful office PIM routines.

Regards,
Selva

Mimi Yin <mimi <at> osafoundation.org> wrote:

Hi Mike,

Welcome to the list. I wonder if you could elaborate a little on your
question about "What is the important part of anything."

In the Dashboard design, it would be the same set of attributes than
any table displayed, with the additional option of enlarging the item
tile so that you could see content from the body as well.

For the scalable fabric design from MSR, I think there are some
heuristics they follow that were quite successful. (ie. If you have
and Inbox window open, showing the sync status and # of new
messages). You could also imagine a UI where the user could draw a
boundary box around the area they wanted to clip.

You're right to say that what you want to focus on is going to change
depending on context, but I think that can be derived from which
items you decide to have "open". If you think about it, the windows
you have open on your desktop at any given point in time are the
things that are currently in your FOCUS. That set of things is
constantly changing, the idea however, is that a UI that allows you
to have more gradations of open-ness between:

"Open and in my face and therefore obscuring other windows" and
"Docked so that I can't really see anything"

would be useful for allowing people to control "degrees of focus" and
also to feel less like they're constantly switching context,
replacing one view with another...Instead the metaphor is more like
zooming in and out and around on a map.

Mimi

On Jan 5, 2006, at 1:20 PM, Mike Pence wrote:

> Hi. My name is Mike and I am a programmer. Scott Rosenberg turned me
> on to this project.
>
> Two things I have observed:
>
> 1 - The DesktopManager for OS X 'feels' right as a context switcher --
> especially when I tell it to use the cube transiton. Then, when I
> switch to another deskotp, it feels like I am just turning to look at
> another side of something, and that maps well to my general
> humanishness.
>
> 2. Creating another visual representation of something for a fisheye
> view is confusing. What is the 'important part' of anything? It really
> depends on what I am doing and what I am thinking about. How will you
> know -- or how can I even tell you -- what the important part of a
> window is going to be at any instant in time?
>
> 3. Try Google Earth. (Windows only for now...sorry.) It is *fun* to
> navigate because you have a sense of place. If I could open a bunch of
> windows on a giant virtual desktop and zoom in and out with my mouse
> wheel, that would be the ultimate context-switcher for me, because,
> again, it just like the Real World. Isn't that essentially what Google
> Earth does with the map? When I want to find something in real life, I
> take a step back. So, give me a way to take a step back, to zoom out,
> and throw in something that at least *feels* 3 dimensional.
>
> Hope that wasn't too obvious is pedantic.
>
> Best,
> Mike Pence
>
> On 1/5/06, Heikki Toivonen wrote:
>> Mimi Yin wrote:
>>> *A Fish-Eye View of the Dashboard: Focused on the NOW section.*
>>
>> The design says (for example) "less and less important as you move to
>> the right and down", but we almost certainly need to make it
>> configurable depending on the locale/localization. Languages that
>> read
>> from right to left usually want to switch other UI components from
>> left
>> to right as well.
>>
>> --
>> Heikki Toivonen
>>
>>
>>
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