kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Tim Hutt <tdhutt@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 10 September 2014 10:25, Javier Serrano <javier.serrano.pareja@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
>
>  There is a big difference between commercial proprietary
> applications and FOSS applications with no paid labor


Definitely true. I think part of the problem is that FOSS developers
generally develop for themselves, and once someone becomes a developer they
are hardly a new user! So features for new users don't get much attention.

Watching 15 minutes of your video has been a very painful experience.
>

Sorry! Though imagine how painful it would have been with Eagle!


> if one accepts the premise that KiCad should be very usable by a new user


I think this is critical. It already looks like some people disagree! But I
think they are just making excuses for Kicad. Even complex software can be
usable for new users. I basically 100% agree with what you said so I won't
repeat it all.

In particular though, I strongly believe:

1. Good software has a manual. Great software doesn't need one.

2. Even complex software like CAD and EDA can be made so usable it rarely
requires a manual. Solidworks is a great example. They have clearly put a
lot of effort into making it user friendly.

3. You *can* learn well-designed programs by clicking around in the
interface. It's what most people do (obligatory: https://xkcd.com/627/ )

One of the best ways to make a program more newbie-friendly without really
changing it is to add something like one of the following:

    a) Rich tooltips.

    b) Qt "WhatsThis?" buttons. They are better than tooltips IMO because
they are obviously there, and they more strongly suggest that the developer
has actually written something useful (not something like "The mangler
button. If clicked it activates the mangler. See help for more.").

     c) "Signpost" tooltips.

Here are some (horribly photoshopped) examples:

Current tooltip:

[image: Inline images 2]

Rich tooltip (if the manual is great, why not link to it more from the UI?)

[image: Inline images 3]

Currently, the help info below is shown in an (actually helpful!) tooltip
which I honestly only noticed when making this screenshot. If you check my
video, I didn't notice it when I actually wanted help!

[image: Inline images 4]

It would be better if the presence of good help is made more explicit like
this (sorry for my bad art skills):
[image: Inline images 5]

Signpost, when you first run Kicad. There could be periodic different hints
(and an option to disable them altogether of course).

[image: Inline images 6]

Anyway, I'm glad everyone has found this interesting and hopefully useful!
I may make a "Usability Project" page on the wiki with links to
particularly glaring usability bugs.

Cheers,

Tim