[Sugar-devel] [DESIGN] Mockups of Home view showing "Start new"

[Michael Stone]

Gary C Martin wrote: (edited)
> Some quick mockups of a Home view idea mentioned in previous discussions.
> Just intended as extra material for todays irc design meeting.
> 
> 1) Ring of activity icons reverts to the "Start new" behaviour; Journal icon
> is always shown for easier access, with recent activities shown below for quick
> resuming. Journal icon and recent activities are shown horizontally for better
> screen balance (at cost of not matching the real Journal list display
> orientation).
> 
>  http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/File:Home_mockup_with_horizontal_journal_and_start_new_defaults.png
> 
> 2) Same as above except that the Journal icon is top left and a top to bottom
> resume icon order is used so that recent activities are shown in the same order
> and direction as is experienced in the Journal list view:
> 
>  http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/File:Home_mockup_with_journal_and_start_new_defaults.png
> 
> 3) Here's a 3rd for the mentioned double ring of activity icons; inside
> non-colour icons for "Start new" behaviour, outside ring of coloured icons
> for "Resume" behaviour. Journal icon shown at top of ring for easy access
> (note that its coloured icon in the "Start now" ring is now out of place):
>
>  http://wiki.sugarlabs.org/go/File:Home_mockup_with_double_ring_of_start_new_and_resume.png

Gary,

These mockups are very nice; thanks. Naturally, I particularly like your
rendition of the double-ring. :)

Several comments on the vertical and horizontal displays suggested by Eben: 

   a) the displays would be better if they grouped activities by type. the
      reason is that your visual memory would then be of some use in finding the
      thing that you want.

   b) the journal icon isn't distinctive enough to really nail down the arrow
      of time. perhaps narrowing the icons as they recede into the past or
      adding more explicit temporal labels would help?

   c) both the vertical and horizontal designs are visually unbalanced and fail
      to integrate meaningfully with the page's primary graphical elements.

   d) how will the frame interact with the horizontal and vertical displays?

More generally, though, I really like the idea of expanding the layout
algorithms to place both "start new" icons and "resume icons". 

Some of the neat displays that I think we could envision as a result of this
look like:  

<pre>
      (* = start new,  .  = resume)

                                                   .  .*:
             *..             .*                    *      *
             *....    o     ..*      or         :*    o  
             *.       X  .....*                       X    *
             *..              *                   *  .    
                                                    :*.  *
</pre>

Note that the ASCII * and . are much too large in relation to the central XO
figure.
  
Regards,

Michael