<html>
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;
charset=windows-1252">
</head>
<body text="#000000" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<p>Hi <br>
</p>
<p>Everytime Microsoft upgrades Windows or Word I get several
comments from users who groan and say, "Why don't they leave it
alone? Why do they always change how things are laid out so that
it takes forever to find things again?" I hear <b>very </b>few,
"Yeh, isn't this better and cleaner and more modern." Generally
speaking it feels like computer geeks like trying new things out
and the majority of computer users wish they'd leave it all
alone... Do we want to please the larger group or the smaller... <br>
</p>
<p>There are of course the new users... I guess for them it's a case
of how easy it is to learn the new UI. I don't know how many of
those there are.<br>
</p>
<p>Graeme<br>
</p>
<br>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 18/11/2016 15:48, Martin Iturbide
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CALRv0Jy6CCWM-6ZYLpa-eJX=3CnxuG8gA3-+uNJqQMnuUwzFfA@mail.gmail.com">
<div dir="ltr">
<div>
<div>
<div>
<div>Hi<br>
<br>
</div>
My personal opinion is that Thunderbird GUI is outdated.
When I got back to use it after some years it took me
several minutes to find out that the calendar needed the
be opened from the top right icon (near the window
minimize icon). Sure that you can customize where the icon
goes, but by default it shows up at the top-right.<br>
<br>
The chat function was very hard to configure and at the
end I preferred not to use it anymore before it was making
Thundebird unstable. It may sound weird but even Lotus
Notes has a better chat integration on the application
than Thunderbird. The Thunderbird address book looks like
a disconnected application that was bundle together with
the package. <br>
</div>
<br>
</div>
I think that Thunderbird's GUI requires an important update.
If there is fear of what can think 25M users can think about
changing the GUI maybe it can be interesting to try to poll
some of them. Or maybe fork the project and make a more
experimental change of GUI to see the user's reaction. <br>
<br>
</div>
<div>I liked the fearless authors of that blog to try to think
outside the box and try a different concept.<br>
</div>
<div><br>
</div>
Regards<br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_extra"><br>
<div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Nov 17, 2016 at 7:48 PM, R Kent
James <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:kent@caspia.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">kent@caspia.com</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0
.8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><span
class="">On 11/17/2016 2:24 PM, Jörg Knobloch wrote:<br>
> This has already been discussed on the "TB Council"
mailing list,<br>
> perhaps Kent can share his views.<br>
<br>
</span>I'm not actually the guy in charge of UI, that is
more Richard and<br>
Magnus these days. But with that caveat, here's my response,
it is not<br>
intended to be private:<br>
<br>
Hi Szymon,<br>
<br>
You've managed to hit us at a very inconvenient time
relative to other<br>
deadlines for releases, but I'll try to give some comments,
without<br>
spending large amounts of time looking in detail at what you
have done.<br>
<br>
... (response for feedback on specific wording of a
prototype to their<br>
original blog post)<br>
<br>
On the user interface proposal itself:<br>
<br>
I would welcome a change in the look of the product while
keeping the<br>
existing functionality. The kinds of changes and polish that
you are<br>
proposing would be very helpful with new users who are more
used to a<br>
different look. But accept this just as my personal comment,
realizing<br>
that I am not the guy who typically does or approves user
interface changes.<br>
<br>
But I have some cautions.<br>
<br>
I think that there is an assumption that "It looked like a
modernized<br>
product straight out of the 90’s" is obviously bad, without
giving<br>
specific reasons that the current design impedes the
workflow of people.<br>
Yes look matters, but people use an email client to get real
work done.<br>
The interaction of look with functionality also needs
considering.<br>
<br>
One example: Including picture icons in the thread pane is a
challenge,<br>
as they are typically larger than the text, and that results
in fewer<br>
lines of viewable messages. This is particularly a problem
in our<br>
default Classic view, where the space available to the
thread pane is<br>
more limited (you have shown what we would call the
"Vertical" view,<br>
that takes three columns rather than our default of two
columns. So the<br>
available space for viewing of the thread pane is reduced in
your design.)<br>
<br>
We at Thunderbird unfortunately do not have a good idea of
why and how<br>
people use our product, nor whether our existing design is
causing them<br>
problems. But as your blog post shows, you are proposing to
modify<br>
Thunderbird so that it effectively looks like very other
email client<br>
out there. Like you said, there are "TONS of email clients"
yet somehow<br>
we cling to 25,000,000 users. I do not think that it would
be wise to<br>
change the existing functional design radically without a
better<br>
understanding of why, if there are "TONS of email clients",
our users<br>
cling to us rather than switch.<br>
<br>
So what I would like to see is a good understanding of the
functionality<br>
of the existing user interface (particularly the thread
pane), and what<br>
additional functionality is lost or gained by proposed
changes other<br>
than "looks more modern" and making it look like every other
client. I'm<br>
not saying that what we have is perfect, or that what you
have done is<br>
not possibly an improvement, but you have not actually
answered the<br>
questions that I think are the most important.<br>
<br>
...(comments on how valuable it would be if their
organization engaged<br>
more directly with Thunderbird).<br>
<span class="HOEnZb"><font color="#888888"><br>
R Kent James<br>
Treasurer, Thunderbird Council<br>
</font></span>
<div class="HOEnZb">
<div class="h5">______________________________<wbr>_________________<br>
tb-planning mailing list<br>
<a href="mailto:tb-planning@mozilla.org"
moz-do-not-send="true">tb-planning@mozilla.org</a><br>
<a href="https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/tb-planning"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank"
moz-do-not-send="true">https://mail.mozilla.org/<wbr>listinfo/tb-planning</a><br>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
</div>
<br>
<br clear="all">
<br>
-- <br>
<div class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature">
<div dir="ltr">
<div>
<div>
<div><font size="1">Martín Itúrbide<br>
</font></div>
</div>
<div><font size="1"><a href="http://www.os2world.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">http://www.os2world.com</a><br>
</font></div>
<font size="1"><a href="mailto:martin@os2world.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">martin@os2world.com</a><br>
</font></div>
<font size="1"><a href="mailto:martiniturbide@gmail.com"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true">martiniturbide@gmail.com</a><br>
Quito - Ecuador</font></div>
</div>
</div>
<br>
<fieldset class="mimeAttachmentHeader"></fieldset>
<br>
<pre wrap="">_______________________________________________
tb-planning mailing list
<a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:tb-planning@mozilla.org">tb-planning@mozilla.org</a>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/tb-planning">https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/tb-planning</a>
</pre>
</blockquote>
<br>
</body>
</html>