unity-design team mailing list archive

[Matt Richardson <m.richardson.1990@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

As a starting point for wizard set up:

1) When you first start the wizard it appears on both screens and 
introduces what multiseat is (many people may not know)
2) Clicking next shows two different messages on each screen. On the 
primary screen the wizard says "We will set up this seat first", whilst 
on the second screen it says "We will set up the other seat first". On 
the first screen the "Next" button is enabled, the second screen has no 
"Next" button.
3) You now run through the wizard on the first screen. Peripheral set up 
is done by asking for input from any devices that want to be linked with 
this screen. i.e. "Now it's time to add your devices to this seat. To 
add a device, simply activate it. e.g. If you want to add a keyboard, 
type something. If you want to add a mouse, move it a little." ***Note: 
How to detect non-input devices***
4) After adding each device the user is presented the option of adding 
another or continuing to the next stage.
5) If multiple sound cards are found (or a sound card with multiple 
outputs is detected) the wizard now goes through the sound set up. 
Firstly it says "Would you like to select a different set of speakers 
for each seat, or would you like all seats to use the same set?" 
Selecting either one takes the user to the next step. If only a single 
output is detected the question changes to "Would you like to use the 
speakers for all of the seats, or for just a single seat?". For both 
questions a smaller size note is placed at the end saying: "For more 
advanced options, select 'Advanced'". This will load the advanced 
settings part (see later) but where the close button takes the user back 
to this screen.
6) Wizard says: "When you're ready, click 'Start' and I will now play a 
series of tones. When the tone is coming from the speakers that you want 
to use for this seat, click 'Stop'." If the user selected 'Use a single 
set of speakers for all seats' at the last screen, the words "for this 
seat" are omitted from this explanation, such that it reads "coming from 
the speakers that you want to use, click 'Stop'."
7) The first screen now says "That's it! We will set up the second seat 
now". At this point the wizard on the second screen has changed to say 
"Excellent! We will set up this seat now."
8) The wizard is repeated for the second screen, at the end of which the 
wizard on both screens says "Excellent! You can now start using 
multiseat! To change more options, click the 'Advanced' button, or click 
the 'Finish' button to close this wizard. If you ever want to change the 
settings, or disable multiseat, just run this wizard again."

When running the wizard on a machine with an existing, multiseat 
configuration the first screen (with the information about multiseat) 
asks the user to select one of three options:
1) Run the Initial Setup again
2) Enable/Disable multiseat
3) Change advanced settings

Each seat would have a tab for it's own advanced settings. There are 
only three settings I can think of at the moment for advanced settings:
1) This seat has control of new devices? [Yes (default), No]
2) Automatically replace devices for this seat? [Yes (default), No]
3) Which speakers would you like to use for this seat? [None, Desktop 
Speakers, Device 2, etc.]

Each of these would have an explanation at the side of the screen, not 
only for each setting, but for each potential value as well.
The first is fairly self-explanatory. By default, any new devices which 
are plugged in will be given to all seats, with the user able to 
manually turn off control of new devices for each seat.
The second refers to a feature whereby, if 'Replace devices' is set to 
'Yes', if a device which was previously set up for a seat cannot be 
detected, and a new, similar device is detected, it is automatically 
given to the seat which 'lost' its device. e.g. When I set up my 
multiseat configuration, I had a logitech mouse set to be the mouse for 
seat 2. I unplug that device and plug in a belkin trackball. The 
multiseat configuration detects that a new pointer device has been 
connected, and gives it to seat 2, as this lost it's pointer device.
The third again is fairly self explanatory, although choosing a new 
option should play a tone through that set of speakers, to confirm that 
this is correct.

Note that whilst this description is for a 2 seat configuration, it 
could work just as easily with 3 or more seats.
The only thing I can't think of at the moment is how to detect non-input 
devices (external hard drives, etc) and more importantly, how to convey 
any such method to the user in a clear instruction. Obviously there's 
probably a lot of other things I haven't thought of, but i thought this 
might provide a starting point.

Matt

On 22/05/12 00:03, pjssilva@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
> > In other words, even if the design requirements can be discussed
> > before the low-level stuff, it's outside the scope of this list.
> I am not completely sure about this statement. Surely there is a great
> part of the setup that is too low level to be considered here. But it
> would be nice to come out with a specification of how the user should
> perceive the possibility of using multi-seat in the graphics shell
> (that is unity). There is some similarities with the support for
> multiple monitors in Unity, I believe.
>
> Some questions that come to my mind:
>
> 1) How should Unity behave if it sense two (or more) graphics cards
> with monitor attached? Should it treat them as a multi-monitor or a
> multi-seat system?
>
> 2) How should a wizard do configure multi-seat should look and feel?
>
> 3) How to transfer the permissions to mount new USB or other
> hot-plugged devices?
>
> Answers to those questions seem, IMHO, associated to this list.
>
> Anyhow, any discussion should be preceded by the discussion if it is
> desirable to treat multi-seat as a major feature in the Ubuntu system
> or not.
>
> best,
>
> Paulo