395638 - don't provide sorting options in Applications prefpane

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Firefox :: File Handling, defect, P2)

Description

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

faaborg's review in bug 377784, comment 45 says we should not provide options for users to sort the list in other ways besides the default sort order (which is being changed in bug 395637).

In bug 377784, comment 46, mconnor says, "I could go either way on this."

Comment 1

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

We want users to search, not browse.  Also, I believe a predetermined order of items will improve the overall user experience (bug #395138 and bug #395637).

Comment 2

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

mconnor, any additional thoughts on this?

Comment 3

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

Requesting wanted-1.9 for this Applications prefpane polish fix.

Comment 4

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

(In reply to comment #1)
> We want users to search, not browse.  Also, I believe a predetermined order of
> items will improve the overall user experience (bug #395138 and bug #395637).

Do we?  That assumes foreknowledge of what to search on.  Making browsing harder doesn't seem like a win to me at all.  What do we gain by removing the sorting?

Comment 5

[Mike Beltzner [:beltzner, not reading bugmail]]

We gain the ability to have the common types on top, and then the rest sorted alphabetically.

Most often I would expect users to search by handler, not by file type, as a way of solving the "I don't want QuickTime to handle my image files anymore, thanks much!". That's supported by search.

Not a blocker, but I agree that this is the better way to go.

Comment 6

[Alex Faaborg [:faaborg] (Firefox UX)]

We don't necessarily have to remove the ability to sort, but I think pre-sorting the list by how common the types are will significantly reduce the amount of time the user spends scrolling to find something.  The column headers normally show arrows to indicate which is sorted.  Every time the pref pane is displayed, we could turn the arrows off and display the list in our predetermined order.  Clicking on a column would re-sort, and the arrow would appear.

Comment 7

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

This bug needs someone to make a decision.

Comment 8

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

Rerequesting blocking-firefox3 and uiwanted because principals are disagreeing in comments on the bug, and we need a decision on this issue to be able to move forward to fixing (or wontfixing) it.

Comment 9

[Mike Beltzner [:beltzner, not reading bugmail]]

Blocking on a ui-decision, will circle back around by tomorrow, if I haven't, please yell at me.

Comment 10

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

Decision is that this is a WONTFIX, the headings/sorting is useful, even when searching