[jsword-devel] Suggestion for improving display

[Joe Walker]

My opinions are:
- if we were to use Lucene rather than Ser then getting rid of the
radio buttons would be sensible (see separate email)
- The restriction toggle would then be missing, maybe we could make
the restriction line hidden unless the toggle is on (it would be
placed between the find text-box and the go button) This would reduce
it from 5 lines to 3 which it is currently.
- My usability concern is that it might make is less obvious that the
passage pane could be edited whenever you want, however since the
select button is more obvious now that is probably less of a problem.

Joe.

----- Original Message -----
From: DM Smith <dmsmith555 at yahoo.com>
Date: Mon, 30 Aug 2004 13:08:03 -0400
Subject: Re: [jsword-devel] Suggestion for improving display
To: Java SWORD Developers Mailing List <jsword-devel at crosswire.org>

 Here is a mock up:
 
 
 When search or match is selected Restriction is enabled and Select is disabled.
 
 We can go one further, if we can merge search and match. We can get
rid of the radio buttons altogether.
 If Find is non-blank, "Go" uses it and restriction to fill in passage
and displays the passage.
 If Find is blank, and Passage is not then "Go" displays the passage.
 "Select" will change the passage as it does today.
 
 I don't know if getting rid of the radio buttons would be too confusing.


 
 
 DM Smith wrote:
 
Several people have made suggestions/requests for improvements in the
lookup/search/match area.
 Perhaps Mark meant that the divider between the LHS and RHS could not
be moved to the left. This is a side-effect of sizing the combo box to
the size of the longest bible name. I  changed it from having a
prototype that always truncated medium size names to one that
displayed them all.
 
 If we put this on a line to itself, it will show the full bible names
and also allow the divider to be moved. It will still limit the amount
of travel to the left, but in my testing it seems to be a reasonable
limit. Any smaller and the reading area becomes too narrow, IMHO.
 
 Someone suggested that search and match should not jump back to the
lookup screen. This would allow the user to see their search request
and the answer at the same time.
 
 I suggest that we merge the three cards into one. The basic idea is
that all three perform a search, the interpretation depends upon
context. In each case the result is a passage. In the case of the
lookup, it replaces the search request with the results. In the case
of the other two, it puts the result in the lookup card and switches
to it. In the case of search/match, the lookup can be restricted.
 
 There still would be a Bible ComboBox picker. 
 There still would be a radio button group of lookup/search/match. 
 There still would be an entry area for search request. 
 There would be a restriction widget, which would be active if either
search/match is selected.
 There would be a lookup passage button, which would be active if the 
 There would be a result text area, which would show the results of
the lookup/search/match
 
 So from a layout perspective 
 Row 1: Bible Picker (or this can be on the same row as radio buttons
as it is now.)
 Row 2: lookup/search/match radio buttons 
 Row 3: Search input w/ Go button 
 Row 4: Search restriction input or Passage Selection button or both. 
 Row 5: Passage result. 
 
 In the case of lookup, row 2 would not change, but row 5 would have
the interpretation of row 2.
 
 Someone else suggested merging search and match and trying to deduce
which the user wanted. This would prevent the confusion concerning the
difference between search and match. I don't think this would be too
difficult.
 
 
 
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