269009 - Make "New Calendar..." dialog more intuitive

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Calendar :: Sunbird Only, defect)

Description

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

The new calendar dialog is pretty crappy. 
There are undescriptive labels such as "Location" for both local and remote
textboxes.

Make this look better and more intuitive.

Comment 1

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Attachment: rev0 - patch revises some language, adjusts dialog

This patch adjusts the dialog size, changes some language, adds some separators
to clean up the dialog, and sets the dialog to be opened as a sheet on Mac OS X
rather than detached from the calendar window but unmoveable,

Comment 2

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Attachment: Screenshot of dialog after rev0 patch applied

Comment 3

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

This also fixed a bug where both the local file and remote url were using the
same entity: "Location"

Hopefully this will decrease the number of questions about how to use this.

I would have liked to do more, but I didn't due to two constraints:
- I didn't want to add, delete, or change the entities since localizers are at work
- Much of the UI may change with the ongoing refactoring

Comment 4

[Mostafa Hosseini]

Comment on attachment 165487 [details] [diff] [review]
rev0 - patch revises some language, adjusts dialog

Checked in without the addition of eventDialog.css.
That setting should move to dialogOverlay.css. It doesn't make much sense to
include a css from another dialog.

Comment 5

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Attachment: rev1 - adds css definition to dialogOverlay.css, removes reference to eventDialog.css

Comment 6

[Mostafa Hosseini]

Comment on attachment 165574 [details] [diff] [review]
rev1 - adds css definition to dialogOverlay.css, removes reference to eventDialog.css

The rest was already checked in. I added the field-label-box-class block to
dialogOverlay.css

Comment 7

[Richard Klein]

Any chance of doing the same thing to serverDialog.xul?

Comment 8

[Richard Klein]

Attachment: Match server dialog to local

This patch reorders the server dialog so it is in the same order as the local
calendar dialog.  It also adds the separators.

Comment 9

[Mostafa Hosseini]

Comment on attachment 165589 [details] [diff] [review]
Match server dialog to local

lilmatt: Can you please review this?
The thing is that a remote calendar can become a locale calendar and a local
calendar can become a remote one so basically the dialogs do the same thing and
there is some redundancy. We need to do proper UI design for these concepts.

Comment 10

[Richard Klein]

Yeah I was really confused when looking at the code why there are so many
duplicate dialogs that do basically the same thing.  I though at some point I
may try to reduce some of the code duplication.

Comment 11

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Attachment: revised version of "Match server dialog to local"

Comment 12

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

Comment on attachment 165589 [details] [diff] [review]
Match server dialog to local

the checkbox should be in the first column to make localCalDialog.xul. This is
fixed in attachment 165714 [details] [diff] [review].

Comment 13

[gekacheka]

Suggestion:

The local paths tend to be very long as the default calendar locations in in the
profile, which on w2k is something like
c:\Documents and Settings\username\Application
Data\Mozilla\Sunbird\Profile\xxxxxx.default\Calendar\CalendarDataFile.ics
A user specified directory might still be something like
c:\Documents and Settings\username\Calendars\CalendarDataFile.ics

So it would be helpful to make the local path field as wide as possible so users
can use "edit calendar" to see where a calendar is stored.
I noticed the dialog was narrowed from 600 to 500, and the label to the left is
longer, so the local path field is 25% shorter.

Maybe reduce labels to the left:
  Local File Location --> 
  Local File
and
  Remote Server URL -->
  Server URL

Also, can move the browse button under the field so the field can go to the
right edge

   Local File:  [__________________________________________________]
                Use this to specify where on your computer  [Browse]
                the calendar file is stored.  Optional.     [button]

Comment 14

[Mostafa Hosseini]

Comment on attachment 165714 [details] [diff] [review]
revised version of "Match server dialog to local"

It seems gekacheka has some ideas. Let's bounce this off him.

Comment 15

[gekacheka]

Comment on attachment 165714 [details] [diff] [review]
revised version of "Match server dialog to local"

This patch reorders the remote dialog fields so the local field is before the
remote field.
It also removes the readonly attribute on this field.
This makes it easy for users to enter the URL into the wrong field.
The patch does not add any code to read this field.  It should not be made
writable.

I think reason there are two dialogs is because 
* Open Calendar File dialog (local)
  - user should enter the local location (first field),
  - remote location is an extra feature for advanced users.  
* Subscribe to remote calendar (remote)
  - user should enter the remote URL (first field)
  - local location is an informative field (readonly)

If they were to be combined into one dialog, how can we better direct
users to enter info into the correct field?

Comment 16

[gekacheka]

Comment on attachment 165714 [details] [diff] [review]
revised version of "Match server dialog to local"

Another issue:	It seems strange to put the checkbox in the label column.

Comment 17

[gekacheka]

Attachment: localCalDialog.xul patch: move browse button under field so field can be longer

Comment 18

[Matthew (lilmatt) Willis]

(In reply to comment #15)
> If they were to be combined into one dialog, how can we better direct
> users to enter info into the correct field?

In thinking about this problem and all the help requests we see, I think maybe a
 more "wizard"-like entry would make sense, possibly with a "Advanced users:
Skip this crap" button.

Something like:
  "What type of calendar would you like to create?"
  () A calendar stored on this computer only
  () A calendar stored on a server so others can see it

etc. etc.

It would be like writing a "choose-your-own-adventure" book, but it's doable,
and it's the sort of thing Tbird/Seamonkey mail/news does with the account setup
(without the skip this crap button)

> Another issue: It seems strange to put the checkbox in the label column
That was strictly an asthetic issue.

Comment 19

[gekacheka]

I would prefer that it be possible to create local calendars without going
through a wizard.  I create one for each project, so I create them fairly often.

The server dialog also appears every time user the mouses on an ics link, so it
should be as quick as possible.

For remote calendars, a better analogy would be subscribing to a newsgroup or
blog.  People may be subscribed to many more than email accounts.  Subscribing
is not done through a wizard (sequence of next pages).  They handle the common
case quickly (public ones), and you can edit properties to change specifics later.

Comment 20

[Mostafa Hosseini]

Comment on attachment 166677 [details] [diff] [review]
localCalDialog.xul patch: move browse button under field so field can be longer

Checked into trunk and branch

Comment 21

[Reed Loden [:reed]]

The bugspam monkeys have been set free and are feeding on Calendar :: Sunbird Only. Be afraid for your sanity!