Sorting control

[CintaNotes Developer]

Guys, do you like the new sorting control? Do you think it is easy to use? Was there any trouble understanding how to operate it?
Would you think that having a bar with clickable field headers (like in Windows Explorer) would be better?

Thanks for your feedback.

[Urmel]

Would you think that having a bar with clickable field headers (like in Windows Explorer) would be better?

Hello Alex

(First: sorry for my bad English, it's not my own language...)

I think, that a bar like in the Windows Explorer is to big in place.

The small graphical search help and control element in the right of the search field is very functional. I see at first glance the sorting parameters and I can change this fast with the mouse (if I don't will use the keyboard shortcuts).

I see a small inconsistency in the view menu by comparison with the new sorting control element. Imho the item "Reverse Order" should be moved to the "Sort By" sub menu. And the sub menu should be renamed to "Sorting"...

In this context I hope, that the requested features "Make link icons clickable" and "Add tooltip with URL to link icons" will be implemented soon.

By the way: I miss a link to your website from the site with the CintaNotes Forum.

I'm now a CintaNote user since a little more than a week. Thank you very much for this good work. Imho it's the best thing between my mind and the bigger knowledge managers that I use. I don't will miss this fine piece of software!

[ale]

I like the new sorting control, particularly appreciated is the button to reverse the list. I never reversed the list before, now I found myself reversing the list more often than sorting it. Maybe things will change when we'll have multiple notebooks, and then I suggest sorting criteria might be a per notebook setting. There were no problem understanding how to use it. Of course everything can be improved but I think it fits nicely the current UI and the development status of CN. My opinion is that a whole bar would be overkill at the moment.

[CintaNotes Developer]

I see a small inconsistency in the view menu by comparison with the new sorting control element. Imho the item "Reverse Order" should be moved to the "Sort By" sub menu. And the sub menu should be renamed to "Sorting"...

I'm afraid I disagree here. It will be difficult to find it in the Sorting submenu. I have a feeling that this is a command that is used fairly often, and should be closer to the top.

In this context I hope, that the requested features "Make link icons clickable" and "Add tooltip with URL to link icons" will be implemented soon.

These feature require reworking of the note renderer, which is quite heavy. So I won't make any promises on when exactly will this come around. But one thing I intend to do sooner: it is kinda dumb that when you sort by links you don't see them. So I'll add the possibility to display links on a separate line below the text. The same goes for note size.

By the way: I miss a link to your website from the site with the CintaNotes Forum.

Yes, you are right here. I'll try to place a clickable CN logo if the top left corner, leading to cintanotes.com.

I'm now a CintaNote user since a little more than a week. Thank you very much for this good work. Imho it's the best thing between my mind and the bigger knowledge managers that I use. I don't will miss this fine piece of software!

Thanks a lot!

[CintaNotes Developer]

Urmel, ale, thanks a lot for your input!

A friend of mine who develops interfaces for living told me that he first couldn't understand the control was related to sorting at all.
He also criticized the name "None" to denote user-defined sorting order. He suggested to rename it to "Custom", and also provide descriptions like "Ordered by title (A to Z), click to reverse order" (on the reverse order icon) and "Ordered by date (newest on top), click to change" (on the field name).
What do you think about it?

I have a very strong opinion that menu item names should be as short as possible, even at expense of clarity, because the user should be able to read and recognize them fast. This is why I won't make the menu item names more descriptive (this was actually my friend's first suggestion). Now however I feel that CintaNotes could really use some tooltips to make it more user-friendly.

Midas, kranor, Nod, I'd love to hear your take on it too. Thanks.

[kranor]

Hi Alex, I have a slightly different take on this. To my mind your Dev friend is correct about none but I don't think that his suggestion fully cuts it. I think that sort order should run like this:-

Default = sorted by date ( the most common for all users I would Guess)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
User Defined = Manual Sorting
Title
Link
Size
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Reverse order

I think that this would provide the most natural sorting for most users also using the most common naming conventions.

I do agree with you on the abrupt titling although I think that you don't have to abandon clarity in favor of shortness.
As to the tooltips, this is something that we have all suggested and agreed with at various times over CintaNotes life and it is there as #41 on the roadmap so..............

[ale]

Ok Alex, guys, I thought just a little bit and I played changing things. Here's an attempt, it would be interesting to hear what you think, even "by instinct". It's only a drawing, a test (the only one I did), to understand if we have a problem now and simply to think together. The idea was to give the same feeling to both the searching and sorting controls (IMHO one of the problems, if really we want to look for problems). The price is that more pixels are needed. The icon is a fast attempt to create an icon for "user defined/custom" sorting, of course a better default might be ordering by date and thus for example a clock wich is a clearer metaphor. I'm not demanding changes, but I wanted to propose something visually to help the discussion.

[ale]

A bit different, using more or less the same amount of horizontal space we have now.

[CintaNotes Developer]

ale, thanks for your very interesting ideas, for taking the time to draw the pictures! I like the idea of adding field icons to the sorting control, although I don't think that we should remove the text description. Only once it is necessary to understand that the control is used for sorting, and in my opinion a tooltip would be better at this. But you are giving about 30% of widget area to a completely static information. The same goes for search. The magnifying glass is immediately recognizable as one of "search" or "zoom", and since it is in a text input field, "zoom" is quickly ruled out.

As for the sorting control, notice that you have moved the drop-down arrow from an easy to find spot (right edge) to a difficult to find spot (somewhere in the middle). Same goes for the "cancel search" button.

[ale]

Thanks for the observations, last experiment for now, bringing back most of your suggestions.
I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I always found a bit confusing the magnifying glass together with the other icon, I mean it felt strange the very first time I saw them, the fact there were two icons one next to the other, and I remember I asked myself what action does one icon trigger? and what action does the second? and they both have the same contextual menu so it was a kind of confusing duplication. Maybe that's why I'm playing redesigning that area
The "search" is a little bit lighter gray and the word disappears when the control has input focus so it doesn't take away useful screen space. I tried two arrangements, on the left I think it improves the discoverability of the control, on the right it's less intrusive and disturbing, especially after first use, moreover my CN windows (is it the same for other users?) has less width than in the examples, so the word may not be too "far away". User (defined) is an hypotetical alternative to "none" or "custom". Well what else? it would be nice to hear other opinions and critics! (which help to improve things).

Oh I forgot, I would like to ask a question about icons. I see icons are 16x16 with 256 colors, is it a technical choice? I mean would a larger color depth or transparency technically possible? (and I know it's a pain to draw and have nice icons, not too colorful, not too bland, ecc ecc...)

[Midas]

[...]He also criticized the name "None" to denote user-defined sorting order. He suggested to rename it to "Custom", and also provide descriptions like "Ordered by title (A to Z), click to reverse order" (on the reverse order icon) and "Ordered by date (newest on top), click to change" (on the field name).
What do you think about it?

I have a very strong opinion that menu item names should be as short as possible, even at expense of clarity, because the user should be able to read and recognize them fast. This is why I won't make the menu item names more descriptive (this was actually my friend's first suggestion). Now however I feel that CintaNotes could really use some tooltips to make it more user-friendly.

Midas, kranor, Nod, I'd love to hear your take on it too. Thanks.

No need to thank me, here's my take:

I have no gripe with the control whatsoever, finding it easy to understand and use, although I do think your friend might have a point with the name displayed -- now that I think of it, generic negative nouns do seem a bad choice from the usability viewpoint; something along the lines of "natural" or "unsorted", to keep with the one word principle (with which I agree thoroughly), would seem somewhat better...

I also completely agree with the need for more tooltips, which should include references to relevant keyboard shortcuts (I have seen apps that are able to do without documentation by cleverly using such a resource). May I suggest that for the sake of future localization and development, you keep interface strings and shortcuts independent of the main executable? I believe the custom nowadays is to keep that info in ini style text files, sometimes disguised as lng or such. The community would be liable to give back then by providing translations and customized interfaces...

Hope it helps.

[Noddy330]

Urmel, ale, thanks a lot for your input!

A friend of mine who develops interfaces for living told me that he first couldn't understand the control was related to sorting at all.
He also criticized the name "None" to denote user-defined sorting order. He suggested to rename it to "Custom", and also provide descriptions like "Ordered by title (A to Z), click to reverse order" (on the reverse order icon) and "Ordered by date (newest on top), click to change" (on the field name).
What do you think about it?

I have a very strong opinion that menu item names should be as short as possible, even at expense of clarity, because the user should be able to read and recognize them fast. This is why I won't make the menu item names more descriptive (this was actually my friend's first suggestion). Now however I feel that CintaNotes could really use some tooltips to make it more user-friendly.

Midas, kranor, Nod, I'd love to hear your take on it too. Thanks.

Alex
Like you I like short names, and find the current set perfectly understandable and clear.
Though I’d go along with Midas’ suggestion of Unsorted for None
Nod

[Urmel]

I see a small inconsistency in the view menu by comparison with the new sorting control element. Imho the item "Reverse Order" should be moved to the "Sort By" sub menu. And the sub menu should be renamed to "Sorting"...

I'm afraid I disagree here. It will be difficult to find it in the Sorting submenu. I have a feeling that this is a command that is used fairly often, and should be closer to the top.

Ok, I understand this "feeling", and I think, you're rigth with this. If an user control this behaviour with the keyboard, the actual status is the faster way.

In this context I hope, that the requested features "Make link icons clickable" and "Add tooltip with URL to link icons" will be implemented soon.

These feature require reworking of the note renderer, which is quite heavy. So I won't make any promises on when exactly will this come around. But one thing I intend to do sooner: it is kinda dumb that when you sort by links you don't see them. So I'll add the possibility to display links on a separate line below the text. The same goes for note size.

Sounds interesting. But I'm not shure, that the actual behaviour with links is the best way for this. For me, the actual way is designed for one link for a note. What is, when I use several links in a note?

On this case, I've found the problem described by "littlebigman":

     http://cintanotes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=451

     "[Editing] Remember hyperlinks in notes..."

I think, that more than one link per note is a must feature for use.

I would like to see that the links are clickable, when the note is shown. But I'm not shure, that this feature is possible by design.

For the searching icons, I think one icon for searching ist enough, I prefer the magnifying glass.

[CintaNotes Developer]

I don't know, maybe it's just me, but I always found a bit confusing the magnifying glass together with the other icon, I mean it felt strange the very first time I saw them, the fact there were two icons one next to the other, and I remember I asked myself what action does one icon trigger? and what action does the second? and they both have the same contextual menu so it was a kind of confusing duplication. Maybe that's why I'm playing redesigning that area

Interesting ideas, especially the one with the text on the left. But I still think that removing the magnifying glass has made the UI more difficult to understand. Actually I've been thinking about making it so that the click on the magn. glass icon would toggle exact search.

The "search" is a little bit lighter gray and the word disappears when the control has input focus so it doesn't take away useful screen space. I tried two arrangements, on the left I think it improves the discoverability of the control, on the right it's less intrusive and disturbing, especially after first use, moreover my CN windows (is it the same for other users?) has less width than in the examples, so the word may not be too "far away". User (defined) is an hypotetical alternative to "none" or "custom". Well what else? it would be nice to hear other opinions and critics! (which help to improve things).

My main gripe here is that the word "Search" is still very static in nature, but dynamic in behavior, so the user gets to see it a lot. I still think that it would be better to have current search mode as text. Like "Search in text and title".

Oh I forgot, I would like to ask a question about icons. I see icons are 16x16 with 256 colors, is it a technical choice? I mean would a larger color depth or transparency technically possible? (and I know it's a pain to draw and have nice icons, not too colorful, not too bland, ecc ecc...)

Yes you are right, I haven't been paying too much attention to icons, just making sure that they are clean and easy to understand. I actually drew them all myself right in Visual Studio (the icon editor there is pretty basic). They could benefit from more color depth, but under no circumstances will I make them look like a Christmas tree.

[Midas]

[...] Yes you are right, I haven't been paying too much attention to icons, just making sure that they are clean and easy to understand. I actually drew them all myself right in Visual Studio (the icon editor there is pretty basic). They could benefit from more color depth, but under no circumstances will I make them look like a Christmas tree.

Why re-invent the wheel? There are plenty OS free PNG iconsets floating around the web (ex: www.iconfinder.net) with perfectly stabilized visual meaning...

My favorite for this purpose would be the "Crystal Clear" set by world famous Everaldo Coelho, released under the LPGL.

http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/Crystal+Clear?content=25668

But I must declare that I for one find the unique look of CintaNotes, with Alex's made up icons, both appealing and efficient.

[ale]

Thanks you all for your opinion. Alex, now that we touched the topic about icons and given that this afternoon I had a bit of free time, I took the liberty of modifying two of your icons as an example (I hope you don't mind). I have to say that I agree with Midas, I like the feeling of the current look and having a unique look is a big plus for me. For example many applications out there use Silk Icons, and they are nice but I usually think... uhuhuh yet another application with these icons!

I redrawed the magnifying glass and the clock, the difference is that I used full transparency and a few more colors.
A) and B) are to show the IMHO advantage against not-white backgrounds. Incidentally at the very first launch of CN we can see the magnifying glass against the gray background (because the notebook is empty at this point). So the white dots may give a "bad" (of course bad in relative terms, it's really not important on an absolute scale) impression. The advantage for the clock is that transparency helps the circular shape.

C) is an experiment putting the different icons on the control.

I'm fully aware that we need more important features and icons are very very low priority (because of the time involved and the relative benefit, if I knew the time I was going to spend today maybe I would not draw them again ), so I'm not suggesting to change things, it's just one thing to keep in mind together one million of others for the future

[CintaNotes Developer]

Wow, ale, these icons look really cool! Do you have them in vector format?
But if we would "upgrade" the icons, I think we need to change all of them. It makes no sense to change only two.

As for the free icons sets, I think this is not a very good idea. CintaNotes is the program that is used every day. It deserves having unique icons. Maybe I'll even order a custom-made icon set from a good designer. There is already some style in the icons and I'd like to keep that.

[ale]

Sorry Alex, I don't have them in a vector format, I drawed them by myself with a pixel oriented editor and I was focused on the 16x16 format. I'll attach them in .png and .ico format.
Yes sure I agree, any "upgrade" would require to change a bit all the icons to have a coherent design.

But how many formats would be needed? if multiple dimensions are needed I fear it would be a lot of work. If 16x16 would suffice, I might give a look to the whole set, just for fun but I really don't know if I can draw something pleasant or useful. I think there are more ore less about 20 icons. Well maybe I'll draw something anyway to have something "real" to see for my eyes

[CintaNotes Developer]

ale, thanks for the files! I've built them in, and also have added the 32bit versions to other icons.
Overall the icons look much nicer and more tidy now. Thanks again!
I think you shouldn't spend more of your time on this, I'm starting to feel guilty

[ale]

I tried the CN test version, thanks. Don't worry Alex. I'm going through them, but just a bit a day, I have a few more done, but I don't have them all ready. Looking closer to the icons raised many questions! it was interesting for me. One question I have is as follows... I found that now the icons for search "anywhere" and search in "text and title" are confusing because they are too similar, basically the only difference is the color. So how would you see a change? I have a proposal and a preview of these two specific icons below. It's also maybe a preview of what you can expect from the other icons.
Do you have something different to propose, also critics are welcome!