Ilya Zakharevich wrote:

To make a long story short: 3 stages is, of course, not enough - especially with applications which target SIMULTANEOUSLY professionals and first-time-Linux-users.

I understand "first-time-Linux-users" as really newby linux desktop users, not beginner-GIMP-users (we have no priority to design for the latter).

the help is there to help with GIMP functionality. not to help with the minimal differences of the linux desktop with mac and windows UI.

so I am a bit stuck where the point is...

--ps

founder + principal interaction architect man + machine interface works

http://mmiworks.net/blog : on interaction architecture

On Fri, 2009-10-02 at 06:22 +0000, Ilya Zakharevich wrote:

0) Remove "Press F1 to view manual" from tooltips unless GIMP knows that a manual is present, and knows to which page to jump.

Since GIMP offers to read the manual online, the manual is always present. Or rather, it becomes rather difficult to tell whether it is present or not. Same goes for the decision on whether the manual covers this topic. The core knows nothing about that and the gather that knowledge, it needs to download the manual index. The change you are asking for is definitely not trivial. It might be easier to just fix the manual so that it covers help for all help IDs.

Sven

On Wed, 2009-10-21 at 00:41 +0000, Ilya Zakharevich wrote:

This is a very sad situation. Note that most of users won't be able to install GIMP documentation locally [*], and in today's state of mobility, people are very often without Internet access...

[*] Try to understand how to get GIMP docs starting at

http://www.gimp.org/windows/

I could not... (Most probably, *I* would be able to do it if I would not decide to restrict access to resources mentioned on www.gimp.org... But most users would be stuck at this point...)

Oh, come on. If you click on the very first link on this page, you end up on http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html which lists installers for all the available translations of the user manual for GIMP 2.6.

Sven

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 1:39 AM, Sven Neumann wrote:

This is a very sad situation.  Note that most of users won't be able to install GIMP documentation locally [*], and in today's state of mobility, people are very often without Internet access...

  [*] Try to understand how to get GIMP docs starting at

        http://www.gimp.org/windows/

      I could not...  (Most probably, *I* would be able to do it if I       would not decide to restrict access to resources mentioned on       www.gimp.org...  But most users would be stuck at this point...)

Oh, come on. If you click on the very first link on this page, you end up on http://gimp-win.sourceforge.net/stable.html which lists installers for all the available translations of the user manual for GIMP 2.6.

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP. I know we probably don't have the manpower to, but it's the only solution that will ever Just Work (TM).

Alexandre

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP.

Ship, that is :)

Alexandre

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP.

Ship, that is :)

Alexandre

YES !!

And anyway label the gimp help as "additional packadge" is pure nonsense: for complex graphic software as Gimp the help is not something "additional" but is strictly needed

On 10/25/2009 04:13 PM, photocomix wrote:

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP.

Ship, that is :)

Alexandre

YES !!

I agree, distributing documentation separately for a program like GIMP never made much sense to me

/ Martin

On Sun, 2009-10-25 at 16:19 +0100, Martin Nordholts wrote:

On 10/25/2009 04:13 PM, photocomix wrote:

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP.

Ship, that is :)

Alexandre

YES !!

I agree, distributing documentation separately for a program like GIMP never made much sense to me

You are ignoring two facts here:

(1) The user manual is a separate project with its development cycle and release dates. If we really insist on shipping the manual with GIMP, then we would have to wait for the user manual to be ready. For GIMP 2.6 that would have meant to delay the release for almost a year.

(2) The user manual is a lot larger than the program itself. If we insisted on shipping the user manual with each release of GIMP, then installing a bug-fix for GIMP would require a download of about 275MB compared to the 16MB that you'd have to download now.

IMO you are making a problem here that does not any longer exist. Not having a release of the user manual for 2.6 was indeed a problem, but that has finally been solved recently. Instead of complaining we should thank the GIMP documentation team for their hard work. And we should thank Jernej for providing installers for the user manual.

It would be a good idea though to discuss what can be done to make sure that help for 2.8 will be available around the time that 2.8 is released. But this is a discussion that belongs to the gimp-docs mailing-list.

Sven

On 10/25/2009 05:26 PM, Sven Neumann wrote:

On Sun, 2009-10-25 at 16:19 +0100, Martin Nordholts wrote:

On 10/25/2009 04:13 PM, photocomix wrote:

On Thu, Oct 22, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote:

IMO the real solution is to shop documentation with GIMP.

Ship, that is :)

Alexandre

YES !!

I agree, distributing documentation separately for a program like GIMP never made much sense to me

You are ignoring two facts here:

My reply was a bit hasty and I apologize. Thanks to the documentation team and Jernej for their hard work.

Keeping the documentation online is in many ways a good idea. There is one thing we could do better though. Right now when pressing F1 without a locally installed copy of the manual there is a dialog box that says "you don't have a copy of the GIMP user manual installed" with a button to go to the online manual. IMO we should take the user directly to the online manual and not nag her with dialogs.

I've talked to guiguru about this previously and to get this to work good is a more work than it initially feels like.

/ Martin

Sven Neumann wrote:

IMO you are making a problem here that does not any longer exist. Not having a release of the user manual for 2.6 was indeed a problem, but that has finally been solved recently. Instead of complaining we should thank the GIMP documentation team for their hard work. And we should thank Jernej for providing installers for the user manual.

The installers are created with Inoosetup, and this tools allows downloadable parts. I've used this once for a small utility which was updated frequently. This happened in a controlled environment, though.

I would rather see an additional page in the current installer than an installer that's double or triple the current size.

Michael

Ni,

On Sun, 2009-10-25 at 17:46 +0100, Martin Nordholts wrote:

Keeping the documentation online is in many ways a good idea. There is one thing we could do better though. Right now when pressing F1 without a locally installed copy of the manual there is a dialog box that says "you don't have a copy of the GIMP user manual installed" with a button to go to the online manual. IMO we should take the user directly to the online manual and not nag her with dialogs.

We only show this dialog once. If you confirm that you want to use the online version, then you won't see that dialog again. I don't think that's too bad. The dialog makes it clear what's happening and it serves as a hint that the manual can also be installed locally. Removing this dialog would be a regression.

Sven

On 10/25/2009 08:13 PM, Sven Neumann wrote:

We only show this dialog once. If you confirm that you want to use the online version, then you won't see that dialog again. I don't think that's too bad. The dialog makes it clear what's happening and it serves as a hint that the manual can also be installed locally. Removing this dialog would be a regression.

If the user presses F1 he is interested in getting help, not being informed that the information he will be reading is not locally installed.

The possibility to install the manual locally becomes interesting if there is no internet connection for example.

/ Martin

On Sunday 25 October 2009 21:21:45 Martin Nordholts wrote:

If the user presses F1 he is interested in getting help, not being informed that the information he will be reading is not locally installed.

True.

The possibility to install the manual locally becomes interesting if there is no internet connection for example.

And thats where the poke is. when there is no internet connection, you cant get a locally installable help either. Sort of a deadlock.

-- Alexia

On 10/25/09, Martin Nordholts wrote:

My reply was a bit hasty and I apologize. Thanks to the documentation team and Jernej for their hard work.

I don't think your reply was hasty :) Having documentation available at once is actually expected.

Provided the documentation project is a separate one indeed, I see two solutions:

1. Make it downloadable during installation, like Michael suggests. 2. Leave .exe files where they are now, but keep amount of clicks to download .exe with docs as low as possible.

Option 1 needs suboptions for every supported language, perhaps. That's a question to Jernej, I guess.

Alexandre

On 10/25/2009 11:35 PM, Ilya Zakharevich wrote:

If you think the dialogue is nagging, it is better to make a checkbox "do not show this again, show online help directly". AND, maybe, never show the same dialogue in the same session.

It won't nag me less just because I can dismiss it for the future. Either the dialog presents important information that I need to see, or it doesn't and I don't need to see it.

These "Don't show this any more"-dialog boxes is a sign of insecureness in the "personality" of the application. We don't want GIMP to be like that, we want GIMP to be confident it what it is doing.

Regards,
Martin

On Sun, 2009-10-25 at 22:30 +0300, Alexandre Prokoudine wrote: [...]

Provided the documentation project is a separate one indeed, I see two solutions:

1. Make it downloadable during installation, like Michael suggests. 2. Leave .exe files where they are now, but keep amount of clicks to download .exe with docs as low as possible.

I wonder if there's a half-way possibility, of having a small subset of the documentation shipped with GIMP, or easily downloaded? And still have the full manual kept separate.

Liam

On Mon, Oct 26, 2009 at 4:28 AM, Liam R E Quin wrote:

I wonder if there's a half-way possibility, of having a small subset of the documentation shipped with GIMP, or easily downloaded? And still have the full manual kept separate.

I actually like the idea. IF we could have maunals for all major bits, like tools and basic concepts, core help, not more that 10MB, shiped with gimp and rest avalable for download, then most bases would be covered. Peraps web help usage stats can help us see what help files are most requested.

Another thing, pehraps worth considering is caching help. If auser has asked for it and downloaded it, it should remain localy available.

Martin Nordholts wrote:

On 10/25/2009 11:35 PM, Ilya Zakharevich wrote:

If you think the dialogue is nagging, it is better to make a checkbox "do not show this again, show online help directly". AND, maybe, never show the same dialogue in the same session.

It won't nag me less just because I can dismiss it for the future. Either the dialog presents important information that I need to see, or it doesn't and I don't need to see it.

These "Don't show this any more"-dialog boxes is a sign of insecureness in the "personality" of the application. We don't want GIMP to be like that, we want GIMP to be confident it what it is doing.

Regards,
Martin

There is some truth in this approach but it should not be taken to extremes. It is not a black or white decision.

This is all part of the KDE-configure everything v. gnome-we-know-best-so-like-it flames.

This binary approach to the issue means both ways run a danger of getting it wrong.

Specifically it is not to be regarded as a personality disorder. That's because the situation changes , hence the user's needs may change.

Maybe you'd see it better if the checkbox (AHH shoot this man , he said the "C" word!!) was labelled "remember this choice".

You can't presume what the "correct" answer is and impose it on everyone since the answer depends on the user himself and availability of connection (and in view of the size you'd better add available bandwidth).

So there's a choice the USER not the GUI designer needs to make. Asking the same question every time he hits F1 may well be a PITA before long. I see a legitimate user for errm ..... one of the square things with an X in it .

We are the knights who say "checkbox" !

Ni ! Ni! Ni!

(cultural reference to Monty Python's 'Holy Grail' for the non English subscribers)

It's a user configuration if you will. This could be hidden ten layers deep like setting the mouse wheel to zoom in , a far better solution would seem to let the user configure how he wants to deal with this situation when it is first presented.

Maybe a better overall approach would be to pop up the help menu on F1 if no help is available. This presents the full choice of options.

Other small defect, Sh-F1 goes into cursor selection knowing full well it can't fulfil. This probably should be trapped on key stoke without letting the user select then telling him there's no help.

/gg/

On 10/26/2009 01:42 PM, gg@catking.net wrote:

Maybe you'd see it better if the checkbox (AHH shoot this man , he said the "C" word!!) was labelled "remember this choice".

You can't presume what the "correct" answer is and impose it on everyone since the answer depends on the user himself and availability of connection (and in view of the size you'd better add available bandwidth).

So there's a choice the USER not the GUI designer needs to make.

This not necessarily true. If the GUI designer is designing an app aiding in translating movies then he can deduct from the target user group that such a dialog box should not be shown. The translator using the app must hear see/hear all words.

GUI designers always design for a well specified target group. With a well defined user group there is rarely a need to guess what the user of an app will want, the GUI designer knows what the users will want.

But there are always exceptions and corner cases of course...

/ Martin

Martin Nordholts wrote:

On 10/26/2009 01:42 PM, gg@catking.net wrote:

Maybe you'd see it better if the checkbox (AHH shoot this man , he said the "C" word!!) was labelled "remember this choice".

You can't presume what the "correct" answer is and impose it on everyone since the answer depends on the user himself and availability of connection (and in view of the size you'd better add available bandwidth).

So there's a choice the USER not the GUI designer needs to make.

This not necessarily true.

Which is what I said in the bit you don't quote

If the GUI designer is designing an app

aiding in translating movies then he can deduct from the target user group that such a dialog box should not be shown. The translator using the app must hear see/hear all words.

But we're taking about GIMP help not some other hypothetical case about movie translation.

GUI designers always design for a well specified target group. With a well defined user group there is rarely a need to guess what the user of an app will want, the GUI designer knows what the users will want.

"GUI designers always " "well defined user group " "GUI designer knows what the users will want."

an impressive collection of fairly meaningless hand-wavy generalities. What is your point w.r.t. whether the user wants to be asked what gimp help format is actually applicable n his actual situation and whether a GUI designer can user pro-active telepathy to know his needs and internet access availability?

But there are always exceptions and corner cases of course...

/ Martin

Call it a corner case if you prefer , how does this relate to gimp help?

thx.