openerp-expert-framework team mailing list archive

[Viktor Nagy <viktor.nagy@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

On Wed, Apr 25, 2012 at 5:34 PM, Olivier Dony <odo@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Hi Viktor,
>
> On 04/24/2012 10:45 AM, Viktor Nagy wrote:
> > as per client request I rewrote the share addon to copy the window
> action's
> > help text too, and make the new shared user with menu tips enabled.
>
> The term "rewrote" makes me a little bit worried, as this should only
> require a
> small extension of the original module, right?
>

yes, it's definitely a minor extension, just a few lines


>
>
> > I would be happy to make a merge request, but would like to ask first,
> if it's
> > likely to be accepted or not. The reason why I ask is that first I
> thought I'm
> > implementing  a new feature, as there were no signs of any contradictory
> > implementations, but than I've noticed that the shared user was created
> with
> > menu_tips=False on purpose (at least in the sense of having
> menu_tips=False in
> > the code).
>
> Yes the menu tips were disabled on purpose for external users because the
> way
> they are written makes them targeted at normal users of the system. The tip
> itself will usually describe features that are not available to the
> external
> users, and as such it will be mostly misleading, useless at best. (BTW the
> majority of external users will have read-only access)
>
>
> > So could someone tell me, if this change would be accepted, and if not,
> then
> > what's the rationale behind the current decision?
>
> Your patch might certainly be useful for certain kinds of use, such as for
> companies who adapt the default tips in order to make them specifically
> helpful
> for external users. Was this the case for your customer?
>
> Perhaps you could publish this feature in a separate module on OpenERP
> Apps,
> with a clear note in the description that explains that this is not
> recommended
> with the default menu tips? I'm sure it would be useful for the community.
>
>
> > My reason for showing the menu tips is that the reason why menu tips
> exist is
> > to help new users, and to me it's a realistic assumption that shared
> users are
> > the least trained in OpenERP. Thus every extra info that can help them
> should
> > be there.
>
> It's certainly the case, but it seems to me that the default tips would be
> more
> misleading for these external users than no tip at all, wouldn't they?
>
> Keep in mind that the current strategy of OpenERP is to be as simple and
> intuitive as possible out-of-the-box, just by looking at the screens. This
> means we'd rather improve the UX to make it easier to understand at a
> glance
> for all users, than include more tips, descriptions and help in the
> screens.
> More text = more stuff to maintain = more translations to do ;-)
> That being said, the menu tips will likely stay in 7.0, and probably be
> enhanced to allow rich text and media. But they should be used sparingly
> and
> their content would still be targeted at the main users first (e.g. what
> should
> you do when you're starting out with an empty list), not so much at
> read-only
> external users, who should presumably understand what to do with the
> documents
> they were shared.
>
> What do you think?
>

My suggestion would be to show the help text for edit mode sharing, and
hide it for read-only access. As edit mode users need all the necessary
information, and usability (in my case) involves a custom tree/search/form
view, showing them a custom help text is natural and is definitely a minor
task compared to creating all the views.

On the other hand, I don't like the separate addon idea, as it would share
99% of the share addon's features, and to maintain such a small change for
future versions, errr .. to me the biggest benefit of open source
development is contributing to the trunk. This way I feel assured that my
code will be running even years later, and I don't like to change core
addons and publish them separately from the core.

just my two cents

Viktor