Tip of the Day Popup?

[axfleming]

I now understand j_c_hallgren's signature.

But we WILL achieve escape velocity!!

[j_c_hallgren]

Friend, from this one statement it is obvious that you are not subjective.
There are two products, as long as they are under development, whose fans will NEVER switch:
Directory Opus and Total Commander.

Advanced people can RTFM.

First, I never claimed to be subjective, but I think I can still relate because I'm constantly trying out new products in various areas and thus know what it's like to be a new user of a product...and what bothers me about those having Tips is that they are generally either too simple or too complex...so having multiple categories would avoid that problem...and be another fairly unique feature!

Second, while a devoted user of those products may not switch, it's very possible that someone who has tried out those products and found them not to their liking may have learned enough about them to want to know how XY compares in those areas...that was my target audience...to be able to take some of what they know and convert that knowledge to XY.

Third, about advanced users RTFM: It's been quite obvious from reading forums here since Jan 2006 that even experienced users (me included ) sometimes forget some of the features that they may not use often or not know of ones that they've never used...And besides, at the moment, there is no real manual! The closest thing is the wiki, which is great (THANKS to jacky!) , but even there, if you don't know what a particular feature is called, you may not be able to find it! So some random tips that bounce around between topics could prove handy, even for people like myself!

I don't want to really argue with anyone here, but at times, there are things that just begin to get me , ok? So hope you understand my viewpoint, which is coming from someone who originally thought I'd post maybe a handful of posts over a few weeks and that would be all, but who found this product and group of forum regulars so addictive, that I have become a real groupie!

[axfleming]

I don't want to really argue with anyone here, but at times, there are things that just begin to get me , ok?

Why would u want to argue with someone who called you a friend?
All who are here care about XYplorer.
Take care, brother.

At this point it is clear I have overstayed my welcome.

Houston, I believe we have achieved escape velocity!


Peace to all.

[j_c_hallgren]

Good grief! What happened? I was attempting to have (what I thought was) reasonable discussion like I've had before with many others here, and it seems the poster took offense, and "left the building"... WTF?

As I somewhat stated on another thread just yesterday, I'm trying to never do anything intentionally to harm XY and/or Don, but it's possible for me to do so by accident or by a misunderstanding...in which case, I'll attempt to resolve the issue as nicely as I can...so....just know that there were certain ways (and words in) a few statements were written that kinda offended me, and I tried to address the issue constructively and to the benefit of XY, IMO...if I failed, sorry, ok?

[graham]

As a total Newbie I am extra qualified top comment about tips in programs. Personally I hate the usual style of pop-up which seems to tell me what I don't, at that time, want to know.

When I need a tip or help then the first call is the help files, XYWiki or as a last resort, this forum.

What is needed, and many have attempted this badly, is to accurately interpret a help request by program and link to the appropriate words describing the detail and possible answer. MS have attempted this but I think it fails badly as they merely present a long list of possible links.

Maybe a simple and effective solution is to have a category for help requests within this forum which will always have the best solutions but of course, depends on the willingness of forum participants and the user being patient as responses are not immediate. Such a solution could be easily (I think) incorporated into XY and save masses of work trying to produce help manuals or tips etc. I would envisage a help entry where the user describes his problem and that gets automatically posted to the Help part of the forum and the user is given a link to access replies.

I don't know of any product that offers this and it could be a valuable selling point but of course it is extra burden on the forum gurus.

[admin]

Why is there this focus on competing explorer replacements?
Hasn't it been established that most users don't use an explorer replacement, and as a result, don't respect explorer replacements?

Why are we not focusing on the common enemy, which is Windows Explorer?
All this talk of dual panes in other products.
Instead of focusing on the smaller market who understand the limitations of Windows Explorer, why are we not focusing on the bigger market who don't realize what they are missing, and how much easier their computing experience can be?

Are we losing sight of the true adversary?!!

I dont agree Axfleming. Dont target any damn thing, why ape or try and copy other apps? Why make anything your enemy? I agree one has to take hints from other apps but not mimic it. I am sure Zen of file management doesnt ask one to copy one or the other app. Let file management be made the unique way, thats what i expect XY to be. Several of my favorite functions in XY have never existed elsewhere, they were invented for XY.

I think he was talking about promotion, not development.

I don't work in an office myself, but friends of mine do, even in IT companies. They are all using Explorer!

[admin]

Maybe a simple and effective solution is to have a category for help requests within this forum which will always have the best solutions but of course, depends on the willingness of forum participants and the user being patient as responses are not immediate. Such a solution could be easily (I think) incorporated into XY and save masses of work trying to produce help manuals or tips etc. I would envisage a help entry where the user describes his problem and that gets automatically posted to the Help part of the forum and the user is given a link to access replies.

The "Tips & Tricks, Questions & Answers" is meant for exactly this. The subtitle might be irritiating to newbies though.

[admin]

Personally I hate the usual style of pop-up which seems to tell me what I don't, at that time, want to know.

Depends on the software. In the case of XY I find it very useful because there are hundreds of little practical things to be discovered that you will never dream of asking for.

[serendipity]

I too hate pop-ups because they are so general which I dont want to know. But in case of XY a smartly designed pop-up can serve greatly. i would prefer specific pop-ups.
Lets say i want to add icons to my toolbar and i use the usual way of click and add. i ask for tip of the day or whatever but choose toolbar as my category and after few clicks i will come across a tip which says "did you know double clicking icons adds icons quickly". Something like that will be more handy than general pop-ups.
Obvious categories are: tree, list, catalog, tabs, toolbar, infopanel etc one can make it even more specific.

[PeterH]

No, I really don't think so. If I want a solution for a problem I would *not* click 23 times on the tip of the day, hoping to find the information I need just now! I think this is the point to look into help file, isn't it?
Tip of the day shows info I do not search for - it is for ideas I would not get otherwise! That's the way I see it.
And if someone hates pop-ups - I would expect this function can be turned off...

[jacky]

Personally I hate the usual style of pop-up which seems to tell me what I don't, at that time, want to know.

Depends on the software. In the case of XY I find it very useful because there are hundreds of little practical things to be discovered that you will never dream of asking for.

One thing that could be nice, as serendipity explains, would be to have tips related to whatever you'd be doing at the time.

For example, imagine a new tab on the Panel, called "Learning Center" or "Tips & Tricks", and whenever you do someting XY would fill it with tips or info somewhat linked to what you're doing at the moment.

So when customizing the toolbar, it would show tips related to it. When on the CKS dialog, it would be tips related to CKS. When starring to drag items from the List, it would talk about the right drag&drop and the extended features XY can put in there, etc

Not only would that be tips related to what the user would be doing at the time, but using the Panel would also make it non-intrusive unlike annoying popups... yet it could still show up to give tips/advice to the user without requiring the user to ask for it (any more than activating this "learning mode", or those "tips")

Of course using a tab on Panel has downsides : it means the Panel must be visible all the time, and can't be on any other tab (way to give tips about the Find feature!)

Maybe a little info/tip "area" (or window, but without "really" being one...) could scroll up from the Statusbar (so above the Panel when visible) to show its content, it would not grab focus or break anything the user is doing, but display a tip during some time (some kind of vertical "scrollbar" could be an indicator of how long it would stay visible).
This would be an option of course, and when visible on that "window" there would be ways for the user to keep it visible (no auto-close on delay), close it, browse amongst tips from the category, change category, ...

[graham]

The "Tips & Tricks, Questions & Answers" is meant for exactly this. The subtitle might be irritiating to newbies though.

Yes I do appreciate the above 'catch all category' but what I was suggesting was something slightly different. I think some users may be intimidated by having to join a forum and just not bother.
The idea I had was along the lines if a user has a problem or query, then in the normal Help menu is an item listed such as 'Ask the experts'. On selecting this, an input message area is created (no need to join forums) with a reference number and the user enters the query and sends it. The answer is then found by the user going to the forum to see the replies.
Yes it is a lot over the top but the concept should hopefully make very easy to make a query and get involved. I suspect many users join a forum as a last resort.

Ok maybe this is not the best idea - but an opportunity to demonstrate the special support and expertise available. In truth, I am trying to see a way to make a specialist tool attractive to people who need something better than Explorer but not put off by the enormous number of features. Lets face it the XYWiki is a very good and clear user guide but that only exists, I suspect, because of the need to clarify the understanding of these many features.

[j_c_hallgren]

So we've had some good and varied ideas here for attacking the problem, but I don't think this approach has been mentioned:

How about we...
Go thru old threads here that relate to "how do I?" topics and create a new section in the wiki that presents these in a organized grouped manner and then either ---
a) points to existing wiki page that fully describes answer (with a partial answer being in the "how do I" area)
b) points to a new wiki page, if needed, that give answer.

Ok, so we already have some of this in the FAQ section, but this may not be as obvious as one titled "How do I?" or similar...plus the number of topics presently in FAQ/HDI could certainly be expanded greatly via this...

Because we, as more knowledgable, may not be able to think as a newbie but there would seem to be a set of questions from Tips & Tricks (as first area to examine) that could be extracted...cause we know that finding an old topic here can sometimes be a real PITA! Especially when one dosn't know the XY lingo!
I've had a real problem finding some of my older posts because I've written sooooo many! The downside of being prolific!

We could maybe then also put cross-links from thread to wiki page/section that now describes that issue so if one found it here via serach, you'd be able to get up to date info via wiki..

This could be a group project with a few of us handling various threads for areas that we know best, and then as usual cross-checking each other in the wiki for accuracy, as even though it's a volunteer effort, pride in XY means we'd like it 100% correct, true?

While this wouldn't be available to take with you on a portable device, maybe some of this could work its way into a file that could be part of package....and this wouldn't take any of Don's time to code, leaving him to do the stuff that we just can't...like custom context menus, etc.

Opinions?

[admin]

Tip of the day shows info I do not search for - it is for ideas I would not get otherwise! That's the way I see it.
And if someone hates pop-ups - I would expect this function can be turned off...

Yep, I'm with Peter here. Some of the other suggestions made here (thanks to all of you!) will lead to growing mountains of documentation -- that's not what I want.

Contextualized tips? No, that's the job for the Hints button.

I changed my mind about the tips. That big luxury HTML version won't happen. Once more, after a short phase of crazy fantasizing, I came to the conclusion that the best way is the main road. So XY's tips will look and function pretty much like all Tips of the day you've seen.
One exception: I will add tooltips that explain some of the used terms (XY lingo, e.g. the difference between "focused" and "selected"). There also will be hyperlinks leading to other tips, or to websites. Not bad, or?

Later, I also might add two selectable levels (Beginners/Advanced) so the tips will not become too boring/confusing.

[j_c_hallgren]

Some of the other suggestions made here (thanks to all of you!) will lead to growing mountains of documentation -- that's not what I want.

It may not be what you want (or wish to create yourself), but if available, can make new users (and even old users) more comfortable with the product...for example, x2 has a PDF user manual that says it was written by volunteers that is 336 pages...and I, as one who used to have booksheves full of IBM manuals, have found it quite helpful!

There may be parts of this manual that could be useful as a sample or model for some areas of the wiki...and if the wiki could be converted to a PDF, then it could be available as a local off-Net file also...

The only thing that's a bit confusing/frustrating is due to x2's free vs paid nature, so there are things that I, as a free user, have to skip over...

IMO, it's preferable to have more doc than needed rather than less, as user can ignore it if they wish...one is not required to read it to use product...