I'll take the opportunity to plug my alternate Journal design, which integrates the Journal and the Home view into one interface. <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Wade/Ideas/Activity_Management">http://wiki.laptop.org/go/User:Wade/Ideas/Activity_Management</a> Tagging can be implicit, since you first navigate to a tag and *then* create the activity instance.  Activities can also be re-tagged easily via a context menu.  Resuming existing Journal entries is the natural action, since the Home view is actually a spatial view of the Journal itself and centers around the child's work, not the list of installed Activities. Cheers, Wade On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 4:34 PM, Eben Eliason <<a href="mailto:eben.eliason@gmail.com">eben.eliason@gmail.com</a>> wrote: > Gabriel - > > Thanks! These are great suggestions. > > On Sat, Dec 6, 2008 at 7:07 PM, Gabriel Hurley <<a href="mailto:gabriel.hurley@gmail.com">gabriel.hurley@gmail.com</a>> wrote: >> After having used the Journal for quite some time, I have some >> recommendations that I think would improve its usefulness. >> >> Category view. I know that the idea of the Journal is to avoid the >> file-folder metaphor, but the ability to organise activities into groups >> would be very useful. For example, a child might be drawing pictures and >> writing a report for a Science class. Instead of searching for these things >> individually, he/she can click on a drop-down menu and select "Science >> Class" and all the activities that were added for this category are >> immediately visible. Already, activities can be filtered by Text, Image, >> Audio, etc. The ability to define and organise activities into categories >> would make the Journal more useful. > > In a sense, this is another way to describe (a better implementation > of) tagging.  By tagging the relevant objects with "science class", > it's possible now to then search for that tag and locate matching > objects.  The two primary improvements we need to make this work well, > and which you allude to, are: > > 1. Make it easier to tag objects.  Right now, this functionality is > rather hidden and underutilized. > 2. Create the ability to browse popular or frequently used tags > (instead of only searching) for them. > > Both of these are definitely on the radar, and Scott has been doing > some interesting prototyping in this area.  It hasn't been run through > design yet, but the ideas are here: > <a href="http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Journal_reloaded">http://wiki.laptop.org/go/Journal_reloaded</a>. > >> Selective automatic saving. Some activities, like the Moon Activity, do not >> involve the user creating anything worth keeping. Yet every time they are >> launched, another instance of "Moon Activity" is added to the Journal. This >> could lead to increased clutter and (over time) less disk space. To fix >> this, the Journal should have a control to select which activities and >> objects are automatically saved and which are not. >> >> Finally, I think every open activity should have a "Throw-Out" icon next to >> the Stop Sign icon. Clicking this would close the activity and remove it >> from the Journal. > > Something I hope will be added in the short term is a naming prompt. > Right now, saving is automatic, and few take the time to tag or even > name activities.  The thought now is to prompt upon stopping an > activity that hasn't previously been stopped (or kept), to ask for a > name and tags.  Then, the child could name/tag, ignore it and accept > the default name, or opt to "not keep" the activity at all.  This > wouldn't be a separate "throw out" button, but an option that could be > chosen when stopping an activity that hasn't yet been committed to the > Journal, which I think would solve the concerns you raise. > >> Thank you for considering my suggestions. If you have any questions about >> them or see any issues, please contact me and I will try to clarify. > > Thank you for offering them!  We welcome all the feedback we can get. > > - Eben > >> Yours Sincerely, >> Gabriel Hurley >> _______________________________________________ >> Sugar-devel mailing list >> <a href="mailto:Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org">Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org</a> >> <a href="http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel">http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel</a> >> >> > _______________________________________________ > Sugar-devel mailing list > <a href="mailto:Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org">Sugar-devel@lists.sugarlabs.org</a> > <a href="http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel">http://lists.sugarlabs.org/listinfo/sugar-devel</a> >