Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus)

Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) - Printable Version

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Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) by V@no on 02-25-2011 at 01:29 AM

Dear MP! team (aka Yuna Software) I'm certainly excited about new MP!5 update, all that changes you've made to allow MP! grow much easier in the future and such, but please, why does each update has inherit the mess in menus?
Lets review our chat window.
What we have there are:
- an "!" icon on top
- "Plus" menu
- sounds button at the bottom
- plugins button at the bottom

All that have their own menus, but some of them have duplicates of others.
For example the "!" button on top, a common sense would suggest that button would have control of what MP!L has to offer, right? Well, it doesn't. The "Plus!" menu on other hand have almost all options the "!" has, plus some extras. Why do we have both of them again?

The sounds button. The access to library was moved to dropdown menu, which is ok, I suppose (at first I thought you removed access to library from there completely, so this is little offtopic), but from that library window why can't we send sounds to the chat window we opened the library from (or active chat window)?

Plugins button - we have available plugin's options, we can access website to download new plugins, but how do we control installed plugins? Do we need click the top "!" icon? - no, we got to go to "Plus!" menu...why not from the plugins button itself?
And I'd bet, most users don't even know "Plus!" menu even exists...

And then finally the main window - it has it's own set of options, some of them not acceptable from chat window...

It is certanly much better compare to previous v4 when we had 3 MP!L icons + "Plus!" menu...but still, too much, too confusing, too not common-sense-user-friendly.

So, dear MP! team, would you please look into this sometimes for next updates?

Thank you.

[EDIT]
Forgot to mention specs:
Windows7 + WLM 2009 + MP!5

RE: Dear MP!L team....(rant about mess in menus) by Arcticwolfx on 02-25-2011 at 03:59 AM

That is a very nice post, I'm glad to see you put your op criticism in a constructive and respectful way.

I certainly agree with some of your points, though I wonder how much this has to do with the difference between Windows Live Messenger 2011 compared to previous versions.

Meanwhile, certain updated skins feature button sets "on off" option, though I don't have some of these buttons by default.. it's quite confusing.

Off-topic: It would be MP! now, the "Live" part of the name is gone.

RE: RE: Dear MP!L team....(rant about mess in menus) by V@no on 02-25-2011 at 04:51 AM

quote:
Originally posted by Arcticwolfx
I wonder how much this has to do with the difference between Windows Live Messenger 2011 compared to previous versions.

Let's compare. I'm using WLM 2009:
Chat window "!" menu:

Chat window "Plus!" menu:

Main window - both "Plus!" icon and "Plus!" menu have same options (the only difference is style of "Plus!" icon):

Basically, because "Plus!" menu is not visible by default and many users don't even know of it's existence, it doesn't needs to be there (another reason is because we can't remove the icon, why unnecessary duplicate?), or at least if for some reason it needs to be there, then it should contain same options as the "!" menu, just like in main window.
Also all additional options that available in main window could be added as a submenu to chat window (why do we need open main window to open debug window or event viewer?)

In main window the last 4 options that rarely used could be moved into a submenu "help".
"preferences & options" should be the last in the list (it's pretty much standard nowadays)

P.S.

quote:
Originally posted by Arcticwolfx
Off-topic: It would be MP! now, the "Live" part of the name is gone.

Oh, I did not notice that...

RE: Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) by blessedguy on 02-25-2011 at 05:24 AM

@Vano: can you host those images somewhere else? I just see a placeholder frog

RE: Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) by V@no on 02-25-2011 at 05:46 AM

Changed to postimage.org

RE: Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) by CookieRevised on 02-25-2011 at 08:02 PM

As for having both a "Plus!" menu and the 'Plus! Logo' dropdown in the contact list:

Both should be there and should be the same. Because not everybody has the menu menu toolbar visible. And the 'Plus! Logo' is not visible/accessable before you have succesfully signed in, yet a menu should be accessable at that point. This is where the "Plus!" menu comes into play. Not to mention that skins could remove the 'Plus! Logo' dropdown in the contact list (I haven't seen one which does, but it could be done).

As for having both a "Plus!" menu and the "!" dropdown in a conversation window:

Imo, these two should indeed be the same (they currently aren't). Partially for the same reasons above.
But I do not agree with having _all_ the options from the main menu also available in this conversation window menu though. Some might be handy, but certainly not all.

quote:
Originally posted by V@no
In main window the last 4 options that rarely used could be moved into a submenu "help".
"preferences & options" should be the last in the list (it's pretty much standard nowadays)

I don't agree. Submenus should be avoided if possible. And in this case it is possible to avoid them without having a massive menu or the need to go thru several submenus to find what you need. Having those 4 items in the main menu isn't that bad at all. I don't see what you could have against it as long as they are seperated from the rest with a devider, like they are. It is not like that menu is unnecessary long

That whole main menu is currently pretty logic. It is devided in sections you'll otherwise find in seperate menus in programs (but Plus! is not a program on its own and I don't think it should start adding multiple main menus). The main menu begins with the main stuff and external stuff, it goes further with what you otherwise would find in a 'Tools' or 'Options' menu and finally it ends with what you'll find in a 'Help' menu. As such, the order of items is correct.

Either way the 'Preferences & Options' item should not be the last item as that would list it in the 'Help' section, where it does not belong. The 'Help' section (or menu for that matter) is logically the last menu or section and it always ends with an 'About xxx' item.

Anyways, it isn't easy to do good for everybody. Some people like to use the normal menu toolbar, some people rather like to use the 'Plus! logo' and '!' dropdowns.
And in the same manner, some people like to have all possible stuff slapped into one giant menu without the need to click thru submenus, and others like to have everything devided up in submenus. On top of this all, everything needs to be in a logic order. But even about this 'logic order' people have different ideas and interpretations. (eg: you could see the two wizards as help-functions, or you could see them as belonging to an 'options' section; although that would have been certainly true for the wizard in Plus!4, it is different for Plus!5 since those wizards are now more aimed and designed to help people getting to know Plus! than to set options directly)

RE: Dear MP! team....(rant about mess in menus) by blessedguy on 02-26-2011 at 02:20 AM

quote:
Originally posted by CookieRevised
skins could remove the 'Plus! Logo' dropdown in the contact list

Agaeti does (A)

The Plus! button is enabled by default, that was the only way to make it "chooseable"

[I prefer the old 4.x logo, so I kept that as an option, disabled by default]

----

I don't think the menus are that bad, they're actually pretty good and organized. Yes, it could get better, but everything can. My bigger problem is with the Preferences panel, but then it'd go offtopic, I guess, aand I'm also lazy and tired :chrongue: