User Experience Interest Group/Transcripts/2009-02-14

Group chat

• [17:41] Morgaine Dinova: waves
• [17:41] McCabe Maxsted: ahoy!
• [17:42] CodeWarrior Carling: Hi there
• [17:42] Morgaine Dinova: Wooo, a quorum!
• [17:42] CodeWarrior Carling: likewise
• [17:42] McCabe Maxsted: yay
• [17:42] McCabe Maxsted: whatre we quoroming?
• [17:42] Morgaine Dinova: Dunno, is it a drink?
• [17:43] McCabe Maxsted: hahaha, it should be
• [17:43] Morgaine Dinova: (That was a very weak allusion to quorn, which isn't a drink :P)
• [17:43] McCabe Maxsted: aw
• [17:43] Morgaine Dinova: Oh, you mean RC2?
• [17:43] McCabe Maxsted: I was thinking, any drink 60% proof
• [17:44] Morgaine Dinova: Hehe
• [17:44] McCabe Maxsted: bah, I'm getting messages out of order; RC2?
• [17:44] Morgaine Dinova: Garn said he was in UXIG, but has just logged out, so maybe group channel failed to open for him
• [17:45] McCabe Maxsted: there he is
• [17:45] Morgaine Dinova: (We were talking about RC1/RC2) --- he says estate tools bug fixed
• [17:45] Morgaine Dinova: Got us now Garn?
• [17:45] Garn Conover: crash bang boom!
• [17:45] Morgaine Dinova: Hahaha
• [17:46] McCabe Maxsted: nods. I've got a fix, but since I'm not an EM I can't test it
• [17:46] Garn Conover: happens when your on a double estate with 46 ppl on
• [17:46] Garn Conover: McCabe if u have a compile that guy is still on last i checked? might test?
• [17:46] McCabe Maxsted: aww
• [17:46] Garn Conover: and and good news
• [17:47] McCabe Maxsted: sure, I can do that; or do you think he'd be willing to make me an EM?
• [17:47] Garn Conover: we might have a Mac Dev
• [17:47] Morgaine Dinova: Woot!
• [17:47] McCabe Maxsted: woo!
• [17:47] Morgaine Dinova: I notied a Mac person offered to dev a few days ago on forum
• [17:47] Morgaine Dinova: noticed*
• [17:47] Garn Conover: i was talkin to another UX who might know some1 who would
• [17:48] McCabe Maxsted: as long as *someone* is up for taking it on :) the longer it takes to happen, the harder time they'll
• have
• [17:49] Garn Conover: McCabe why nto let him dl and try it?
• [17:49] McCabe Maxsted: maybe we should start annotating the source, like, "MACDEV: look here!"
• [17:49] McCabe Maxsted: haha
• [17:49] Garn Conover: hehe
• [17:49] McCabe Maxsted: garn: the source is up on git, and there are compile instructions on the wiki
• [17:50] Morgaine Dinova: Good point. If you can't clone and build it, not going to help much as a dev ^_^
• [17:51] Garn Conover: still doesn't understand any of that stuff :)
• [17:52] McCabe Maxsted: is trying to knock out all the non-gstreamer fixes so I can focus on the region crossing stuff
• morgaine's reported (also you'll be happy to know I applied the track/artist listing patch, which is just *begging* for some ui
• ;)
• [17:52] McCabe Maxsted: *kicks group chat*
• [17:52] McCabe Maxsted: anything I'm sending going through?
• [17:52] McCabe Maxsted: it actually makes sense once you wrap your head around it, it's just getting to that point, haha! I
• wish Git didn't have such a steep learning curve. It's so perfect
• [17:52] Garn Conover: McCabe u get to talk to Jacek about the animation idea i had?
• [17:53] Morgaine Dinova: McCabe: Welcome to the joys of group IM over UDP :-(
• [17:53] McCabe Maxsted: boo
• [17:53] McCabe Maxsted: damn lossy chat
• [17:54] Garn Conover: that would be an uber fix lol
• [17:54] Garn Conover: no more chat errors!
• [17:54] Garn Conover: find a fix then hold it for ransom!
• [17:54] McCabe Maxsted: weren't they going to move it to tcp?
• [17:54] Morgaine Dinova: The fix for group IM is, sadly, not to use LL's
• [17:54] McCabe Maxsted: hahaha
• [17:55] Garn Conover: is in a really good mood today
• [17:55] McCabe Maxsted: aww. Because of V-Day?
• [17:55] Morgaine Dinova: Tempted to work on groups and group IM for Opensim, although it would be independent of Opensim, a
• separate web service.
• [17:55] Garn Conover: spent the morning ambusing Linden's and Mentors with Big Purple Fluffy Werepoodle hugs!
• [17:55] Morgaine Dinova: lol
• [17:55] McCabe Maxsted: haha
• [17:56] Garn Conover: grins goofily
• [17:56] McCabe Maxsted: I suppose I should go just to see how bad the lag is XD
• [17:56] Garn Conover: terrible
• [17:56] McCabe Maxsted: last year, I think I pressed forward and somehow ended up across the grid after five minutes of freeze
• frame
• [17:58] McCabe Maxsted: oooh, I just figured out what the "chat history not scrolling bug" is
• [17:58] Garn Conover: lol
• [17:58] Garn Conover: yeay!
• [17:58] Morgaine Dinova: Woohoo McCabe!
• [17:58] McCabe Maxsted: it you set focus to your chat history *right* as someone talks, it doesn't scroll down
• [17:59] Morgaine Dinova: Yeah, it's damn annoying
• [17:59] Garn Conover: nods
• [17:59] Morgaine Dinova: But how did that regression happen? Nothing's touched the IM window for ages
• [18:00] Garn Conover: same thing that broke the history logs for it
• [18:00] Garn Conover:  ?
• [18:01] McCabe Maxsted: it probably is my fix for group chat not scrolling to the bottom when show last IM in conversation is
• enabled
• [18:02] McCabe Maxsted: *roots out commit*
• [18:03] Garn Conover: MCCABE!
• [18:05] McCabe Maxsted: [1]
• [18:06] McCabe Maxsted: I'm actually not sure if there's a fix for htis, since if the user is scrolling up through the chat
• history we don't want to force them down to the nearest chat; perhaps freezing text on focus received to make sure there are no
• updates when focus changes
• [18:07] Garn Conover: yea thats always been a pain for me, scanning up looking for something to have some1 chat and bump it
• back down
• [18:08] McCabe Maxsted: nods. That's a case of "surprise behavior" that should be avoided
• [18:08] Morgaine Dinova: Just mode it McCabe --- provide a "Locked" button that lights up when scrolled to bottom, but if the
• user scrolls upwards then unlock it.
• [18:08] Morgaine Dinova: Then no surprises
• [18:09] Garn Conover: what relocks it?
• [18:09] McCabe Maxsted: hm, that sounds rather confusing; would have to explain what that state means, how to use it, etc
• [18:09] Morgaine Dinova: Either scrolling down to bottom on actiually clicking Locked locks it
• [18:09] Morgaine Dinova: Tooltip will explain what it does
• [18:10] Garn Conover: i went for a while before i even knew about tooltips Morg
• [18:10] Morgaine Dinova: "If this is ON (lit up), then incoming chat scrolls the screen up automatically".
• [18:11] Garn Conover: i'd almost think about using a key
• [18:11] Morgaine Dinova: I like visual feedback on UI.
• [18:11] Garn Conover: if a key is held with window active it stops autofeed
• [18:11] Morgaine Dinova: The lock status is a must.
• [18:12] Morgaine Dinova: You could just colour the scroll bar instead, but that's far less obvious than having an explicit
• Locked button+indicator.
• [18:13] McCabe Maxsted: I think that'd prolly be a little-understood indicator. No toher chat window I know of has one, they
• all just work
• [18:13] Charlette Proto: the window should stop scrolling when you put a cursor on the text inside eg selecting to copy, which
• then is the task at hand not reading new entries, same for main chat
• [18:14] Morgaine Dinova: McCabe: they all just work in the manner I described --- the only difference is that there's usually
• no indicator for the mode, it's hidden. :-)
• [18:14] McCabe Maxsted: hmm, it could stop scrolling when the mouse is hovered over the window
• [18:14] Morgaine Dinova: Jeez no, the mouse is roaming everywhere
• [18:14] Garn Conover: but how does that work for scrolling up? is the scrollbar part of the window?
• [18:14] McCabe Maxsted: well, not IRC :)
• [18:15] McCabe Maxsted: yeah; I'd prefer to avoid using any mouseover, well, anywhere, haha
• [18:15] Charlette Proto: maybe worth testing but clicking in the window (focus) certainly should
• [18:16] Morgaine Dinova: Mouseover help (tooltip) makes sense though for help, since by definition you're interested in knowing
• about something when you're hovering over it.
• [18:16] Morgaine Dinova: Clicking in the window should ***NOT*** scroll to bottom --- you'd never be able to paste from the
• text.
• [18:17] McCabe Maxsted: hrm. I'd say that any feature that requires a mouseover to make sense isn't a very usable feature
• [18:17] McCabe Maxsted: yeah
• [18:17] McCabe Maxsted: I do hate that "feature"
• [18:18] McCabe Maxsted: what about a [ >|
• [18:18] Morgaine Dinova: Yeah, it's a totally disastrous "feature". Currently we always lose our position in scrolled-back
• text whenever we change window focus. Who the hell though that one up at LL ... grrrr
• [18:18] Garn Conover: u guys
• [18:18] Garn Conover: if the local chat window is in focus and click auto scroll stops
• [18:19] Charlette Proto: I meant focus in the text history should stop scrolling till you focus in the entry field
• [18:19] Garn Conover: it does
• [18:19] Garn Conover: i just tested it
• [18:19] Morgaine Dinova: McCabe: you mean just below the current top and bottom buttons? Yeah, that would work.
• [18:19] Charlette Proto: OK, I had some probs with that, but that was SL RC I think
• [18:20] Garn Conover: yea ive got one of the nci alts with me
• [18:20] McCabe Maxsted: yeah; part of the problem is the "rounded" scrollbars LL's skin uses too, I think; they don't give a
• good indication of scrolling distance
• [18:21] Garn Conover: u know now that im testin this i see no problem other than it not auto scrolling when the local chat
• window is in focus
• [18:22] Garn Conover: every other time it scrolls properly for me
• [18:22] Morgaine Dinova: Please don't make any program logic depend on focus. It's a nightmare. Things should not stop
• working as expected just because focus is elsewhere.
• [18:22] Garn Conover: almost seems to its a feature that is not known fully
• [18:23] Garn Conover: well thats the way its working currently
• [18:23] McCabe Maxsted: yeah; I think LL asumed that "you're clicking on an IM/chat history, you must be wanting to always send
• a message" which is why the entire window scrolls down
• [18:23] Morgaine Dinova: Ew
• [18:23] Morgaine Dinova: Bad assumption
• [18:23] Garn Conover: well ive always said the double chat bars are a pita
• [18:24] McCabe Maxsted: anything in particular annoy you about them?
• [18:24] Morgaine Dinova: Input shouldn't be coupled to output. You can perfectly well be typing input to a session while
• referencing something back in history.
• [18:24] Garn Conover: well my lower one is always open.. so it just seems wasted to have the one on local
• [18:25] Garn Conover: it makes sense when its in the communicate window, but after its ripped it seems like extra
• [18:26] Charlette Proto: the text entry box on local chat window? I use that and hide the one on the toolbar
• [18:26] McCabe Maxsted: hrm, I wonder how weird it would feel to suddenly have your chat bar blink in and out depending on if
• the history has focus
• [18:27] Garn Conover: i agree that having the history have focus in a way is stupid.. but only because there is no way to know
• what it does
• [18:28] Morgaine Dinova: Oh McCabe, everyone would love you if you allows the input text bar to be hidden with a button! No
• more misposts! :-))))
• [18:30] Charlette Proto: another thing; could the tab key switch the IM/chat tabs instead of going past the hidden ones?
• [18:31] McCabe Maxsted: hm, I can do throw a debug setting in there to do that
• [18:31] McCabe Maxsted: charlette: how do you mean?
• [18:33] Charlette Proto: atm the tab key moves the cursor from entry box to send then the active tab (which doe nothing) and
• back to the top group info, but it could go to all other tabs eg chat and other IMs instead of the one that is active since that
• is useless
• [18:35] McCabe Maxsted: that's the default action for tab though: cycle through anything clickable
• [18:35] McCabe Maxsted: huh it doesn't touch the close etc. boxes, another bug found, haha
• [18:36] Geneko Nemeth: It's not supposed to do that, although there's no way to open the window management menu in Sl (in
• Windows it's Alt+Space)
• [18:36] Charlette Proto: but clicking the active tab does nothing and clicking the others would actually be of some use to
• cycle through the boxes
• [18:36] McCabe Maxsted: is that jsut a windows-only thing? I use tab a lot when browsing
• [18:37] McCabe Maxsted: and shift-tab to cycle backwards
• [18:37] Geneko Nemeth: Actually, you can switch tabs in second life with Alt+<- (!) and Alt+-> (!).
• [18:37] Morgaine Dinova: No, Alt-tab is X11 too
• [18:37] Charlette Proto: well imagine that you could tab IM boxes instead of having to grab the mouse
• [18:37] Geneko Nemeth: Which most applications take as "back" and "forward"...
• [18:38] Morgaine Dinova: However, Alt-tab should ***NOT*** be caught by the application, since all O/S's use it to switch
• between the current apps.
• [18:38] Garn Conover: sweet i just won 500 bucks
• [18:38] Geneko Nemeth: You can use Ctrl+Tab for that.
• [18:38] Garn Conover: lol
• [18:39] McCabe Maxsted: you can, charlette; geneko just reminded us all of the shortcut
• [18:39] Geneko Nemeth: Ctrl+tab is often used switching between windows in MDI.
• [18:39] Morgaine Dinova: Ctrl-tab is precisely for that, tab movement within an app. Alt-tab is for the O/S's app switching.
• [18:39] McCabe Maxsted: ctrl-tab scrolls a line editor by word instead of character
• [18:40] Morgaine Dinova: Yeah, it's redefinable inside an app
• [18:40] Morgaine Dinova: But Alt-Tab should not be, or you shaft the O/S
• [18:40] McCabe Maxsted: does alt-tab do anything other than app switching in the app?
• [18:40] McCabe Maxsted: just tried it, opens the app switcher for me
• [18:41] Charlette Proto: so why does the tab move focus to the active IM window tab when it does nothing since the tab is
• already selected
• [18:41] Morgaine Dinova: Which is correct, it's the O/S's app-switch keycommand, on X11 and Windows
• [18:41] Geneko Nemeth: weird. Ctrl+Tab focuses on the volume slider first. shouldn't it be thebottom toolbar first?
• [18:41] McCabe Maxsted: it actually focuses on the tab bar, which you can move back and forth with just the arrows
• [18:41] Geneko Nemeth: And why is the root window (the world) never focused?
• [18:41] McCabe Maxsted: can see how that'd be confusing without knowing how tabs are built though
• [18:41] Geneko Nemeth: But that slider isnt exactly the easiest to find.
• [18:42] Geneko Nemeth: By the way, remember to post a transcript later? If everyone connsents of course....
• [18:43] Geneko Nemeth: .... or not.
• [18:43] McCabe Maxsted: hah woah, you can tab through the entire toolbar
• [18:43] McCabe Maxsted: sure
• [18:43] McCabe Maxsted: where to be posting?
• [18:43] Garn Conover: u never knew that McCabe lol
• [18:43] Garn Conover: i leanred that when my mouse died
• [18:43] Morgaine Dinova: Talking about world focus, it's always annoyed me that there's no indicator for it. All MMO clients
• have the concept of target bar, and really we need something similar so we know when the world has the focus.
• [18:43] McCabe Maxsted: no, I didn't know you could tab up to group notices either. Didn't think the lindens would be that
• consistent, hahaha
• [18:44] Morgaine Dinova: McCabe: prolly a bug :P
• [18:44] Garn Conover: group notcies too? nice lol
• [18:44] Garn Conover: haha
• [18:44] Geneko Nemeth: Well I was thinkin that since it's a rare on-topic chat it would be nice to archive it somewhere.
• [18:44] McCabe Maxsted: you mean an indicator you're focused on the 3D world?
• [18:44] Morgaine Dinova: Yeah
• [18:44] McCabe Maxsted: grins at geneko
• [18:44] Geneko Nemeth: Not all MMOs have that.
• [18:44] McCabe Maxsted: what does it look like in other MMOs?
• [18:44] Garn Conover: waves to Geneko
• [18:45] Morgaine Dinova: A bar that describes what the current thing pointed at is
• [18:45] McCabe Maxsted: (and I'll throw it up on the wiki later)
• [18:45] McCabe Maxsted: hmm
• [18:45] McCabe Maxsted: we could flash the title bar
• [18:45] Geneko Nemeth: Well... actually no MMOs have an indicator of "you're focusing on the world" since you're always
• focusing on it, that's just what you're fosucing at in-world.
• [18:45] McCabe Maxsted: like, turn it light gray when you're focused on the UI, dark gray inworld, or something like that; what
• would be the benefit though?
• [18:46] Geneko Nemeth: In Second Life the role is played the tooltip (which has been turned off by default in the previous two
• releases).
• [18:46] Geneko Nemeth: Not much... I think as long as you're not focusing on anything atop of it it would be fousing on the
• root window.
• [18:46] Morgaine Dinova: Yes, it would let you know when you can move with cursor keys. And in due course, we can use it for
• normal game target selection./
• [18:47] Morgaine Dinova: Currently there is no indicator of whether you can move in world or not. Focus might be on UI, and
• you can never tell/
• [18:47] Morgaine Dinova: Feedback FTW
• [18:47] Geneko Nemeth: can always move because he has a joystick
• [18:48] Charlette Proto: I kind of get it, you saying that tabbing through the IM tabs rather than using arrows would be
• inconsistent with the rest of the interface
• [18:48] Geneko Nemeth: Maybe have your nametag lit up when it's focused?
• [18:48] Morgaine Dinova: Geneko: good idea :-) But people with mouse and keyboard only should be supported too :-)
• [18:48] Geneko Nemeth: You can use arrows too.
• [18:48] Geneko Nemeth: That *is* for people with mouse and keyboard only.
• [18:48] McCabe Maxsted: hmm, do people get confused when chatting, or also when dong other stuff like sitting too? I know it's
• weird that the movement controls light up when you're sititng down even though you can't move
• [18:48] McCabe Maxsted: charlette: yup, you got it
• [18:49] Geneko Nemeth: for joysticks it's always controlling the avatar. Unless you patch in joystick support for UI, of
• course. which is something really needed
• [18:49] Charlette Proto: the tag would highlight just the same BTW selected tags should be highlighted
• [18:49] Geneko Nemeth: switching between tools... nah.
• [18:49] Geneko Nemeth: You can arrow between IM tabs though.
• [18:50] Charlette Proto: yeah I said that before I get it now
• [18:50] Geneko Nemeth: It's just inconsistant with all other apps...
• [18:51] Charlette Proto: it works, but more complicated that a few more tab clicks
• [18:51] Geneko Nemeth: Also I think the tags is a bit too big. And voice indicator probably can be merged with it.... and
• perhaps a text chat indicator too.
• [18:52] McCabe Maxsted: how would you indicate it in the tag?
• [18:52] Geneko Nemeth: put the dot before, above or below the name tag.
• [18:53] McCabe Maxsted: like, lock it in, so it always changes the same way the tag does?
• [18:53] Geneko Nemeth: Kind of.
• [18:54] Geneko Nemeth: Merge them to be one element.
• [18:55] McCabe Maxsted: hm, I'm trying to picture how indicating voice volume would look built into the tag
• [18:55] Geneko Nemeth: Imagine something from the nearby local speakers tab.
• [18:56] McCabe Maxsted: hmm, I could see that. How would you indicate typing, though? "klak-klak-klak"?
• [18:57] Geneko Nemeth: I don't know, really.
• [18:57] Charlette Proto: that would be great to have the dot and level bar in the tag in my view
• [18:57] Geneko Nemeth: It could be a thought bubble icon with animated dots but that would look like what I want for the chat
• icon...
• [18:58] Geneko Nemeth: Or it could be a keyboard just to drive the typing err... metaphor?
• [18:58] Charlette Proto: as it is the dot gets lost on light background and is quite ambiguous as to whose it is
• [18:58] McCabe Maxsted: hehe, that could be pretty cool; a little keyboard gif of different keys typing
• [18:58] McCabe Maxsted: yeah, that's true charlette
• [18:58] McCabe Maxsted: it only really says "I have voice" after you see someone actually using it
• [18:59] Geneko Nemeth: j2c! J2C!
• [18:59] McCabe Maxsted: bah; j2c!
• [18:59] Geneko Nemeth: (Actualy SL should support PNG and TGA too...)
• [18:59] McCabe Maxsted: I gotta say I love the dazzle team for letting us use png/tga/jpeg instead of j2c
• [18:59] Geneko Nemeth: Nah, only so serious :3
• [19:00] Charlette Proto: and noobs never get it or often confuse which one belongs to who nametag would resolve all that
• [19:00] McCabe Maxsted: sidenote: the worst offender is the login screen: state_startup.j2c I think it's called; loading it
• takes *forever* when it's not j2c
• [19:01] McCabe Maxsted: would it be cool if they changed color for friends? the voice dots, I mean; yellow for a friend
• [19:01] McCabe Maxsted: if they're going to be integrated in the tag, they need to always be enabled, so we'd need colors for
• voice activated/inactive too
• [19:02] Geneko Nemeth: One problem, the chat indicator is "attached" to head while the nametag is "attached" to agent height.
• So for furries (whose avatars are like mascot costumes), it sometimes block their head.
• [19:02] Geneko Nemeth: No need for colors.
• [19:02] Geneko Nemeth: If someone is listening only then draw a bar aroundthe dots.
• [19:02] Geneko Nemeth: If someone is not on voice, don't show the dot.
• [19:03] Charlette Proto: I agree and on the nametag that would be less of a colour mess in the world view
• [19:03] Geneko Nemeth: If put on the top/bottom, you can have a half-circle as the background forthe voice dot, so if somebody
• dont have voice there won't be that circle and so would be easier to recognize.
• [19:04] Geneko Nemeth: It's not like I like propritary voice systems... :<
• [19:04] McCabe Maxsted: well, then you'd have the same problem of nobody knowing what hte dot did, and having some people
• running around with dots and some not; better to make the dot always be a voice indicator so people can just look to see what it
• shows, rather than checking if it exists or not in a particular tag
• [19:04] Geneko Nemeth: Well, I'll draw something quick up....
• [19:05] McCabe Maxsted: yeah, I know what you mean, heh; vivox was *supposed* to be add an opensource distribution license for
• SLvoice in january but there's been zero movement on that
• [19:05] McCabe Maxsted: even then I'd love to have an actual OS voice client
• [19:06] Geneko Nemeth: I'm worried if they can open source it at all, You know, that " Polycom® Siren14(TM) (ITU-T Rec. G.722.1
• Annex C)" thing...
• [19:06] Morgaine Dinova: I don't even want to know what people sound like, it messes with my head totally.
• [19:07] Geneko Nemeth: It does. My voice betrays my avatar.
• [19:07] Geneko Nemeth: Then so does listening to animated adaptions for manga...
• [19:07] Garn Conover: u said something simular to cupid earlier
• [19:08] Geneko Nemeth: (Geneko, 7 years ago: InuYasha is a BOY?!!)
• [19:08] McCabe Maxsted: hahaha