[ggo-discussion] usability: players

Hi Peter:

At 06:23 02.05.2003 -0700, I wrote:

> >1. When I push a sorting label for the second time I have come
> > to expect that the sorting order reverses.

--- Peter Strempel <zotan@xxxxxx> replied:

> Swing tables don't support a two-state column ...
> Currently you can left/right click to get 
> ascending/descending view. I of course could implement a flag and
> toggle that to get the same effect with left/left click, but I 
> thought left/right click should be sufficient. 

Nay. Don't bother. If it is standard enough it will be the standard
behavior in a later Swing (or yet another Sun-JavaGUI library
replacing Swing).

...
> >3. Refresh causes you to lose 'where you were' completely. 
> >Maybe it could preserve the percentage part of the list? 
> >Most of the time it will show just about the same players 
> > - which is what the user was
> >looking for when he pressed 'Refresh'.
 
> Unsure if that is possible. These Java Swing tables are not so
> great. One would need to remember the position of the scrollbar 
> and force to scroll it back to that relative position again. 
> I've no idea if that works.
> I personally keep my table at +/- 2 stones range if I want to
> play, 

There are three level groups one might be interested in:
People I learn from, teachers
People I want to play, peers
People I may teach, lowest pupils

Not that you should build an interface on that. 
It is just something that came up thinking about the 
possible user expectations.

...
> And when I am not so interested in the player list anyways, 
> I let the 
> automatic updates do the refreshes. 

Which _does_ preserve the place in the list. 
?! 
This means that you already know how to do that, 
but you just don't know that you know ? 


> Once a minute is frequent
> enough, I guess.

Yep. It is definitely not a big thing.
 
> >4. It would be __very__ nice if I could add a little (client
> > side persistent) comment to players, not only 'friends' 
> > state.
> 
> Jarkko had suggested a very powerful player database, similar to
> the one in his own client (Ambassador). If I do this, I do it 
> right, and not only a simple comment line. 

The friend / ignore thingy makes the experience personal, 
gives the whole a real networking (of people, not computers)
taste. As far as I can tell Jago started it, CGoban followed suit. 

A simple comment (ok maybe just a little more) would build on that.

I like inchpebbles, not milestones. A powerful database
would be overkill, changing the character. Just a comment line 
would be a small extension along the right line. 

> However, this is not on the top priority
> TODO list.

Ok. Pity though. As you can probably tell this is one item
I really think has a huge impact/lines of code ratio
(unlike the powerful database idea).



Another 2 Eurocents,

regards,
                      mAsterdam 

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