[mythtv] MythTV Usability Report

[f-myth-users at media.mit.edu]

    Date: Mon, 9 Jan 2006 00:50:41 -0500
    From: Isaac Richards <ijr at case.edu>

    On Monday 09 January 2006 00:39, f-myth-users at media.mit.edu wrote:
    > What, exactly, would such a list look like?
    >
    > (a) What form would it take?
    > (b) One big list, or lots of little lists?

    Small bits, or one at a time.  Making sure, of course, that the problem is 
    myth, not, say, knoppmyth like the vast majority of your list was.

Of course.  (But I'll note in passing that the non-KP ones were also
dismissed, even ones with suggested fixes.  But we'll just let that go
and start over, shall me? :)

    > (c) In Trac?  In mail?  On a website?  In beetles battling in bottles?

    Trac's for bugs and patches.  mail or wiki would be preferable, I'd think.

Okay.  I'd guess that they should get hosted on Kristjansson's
website, given his offer (Daniel? are you thinking of a wiki,
or something you'd have to maintain yourself?).  Presumably
the workflow would be discussion-on-users-or-dev -> wiki ->
some developer decides to implement something -> trac -> release?
(I have to wonder whether a second Trac, or another section of the
current one, might be easier to organize and require less duplication
of effort to set up & use.)

    > (d) Based on what release?  Latest-this-minute?  Within the last
    >     month?  Stable?

    Reasonably recent SVN, or a stable release if one was released recently.  I 
    would expect anyone spending time on something like this to at least _check_ 
    current SVN to see if the issues they're discussing still exist, as well.

Tricky for users wanting to run stable w/o owning extra hardware, but
maybe doable, especially if "reasonably recent" was well-defined.

    > (e) Would code be -required- when discussing usability?  Would design
    >     be sufficient?  Would complaining "this confuses x users" be
    >     sufficient?  Would complaining "this confuses me, and I don't
    >     know if it confuses others" be sufficient?

    No code required, but it sure helps.  Suggested fixes at a bare minimum.  GUI 
    mockups would be good.  A list of complaints by itself is useless.

Okay.  (This should probably wind up on Daniel's website as guidelines.)

P.S.  I mentioned in other mail that the user wishlist currently at
http://www.mythtv.info/moin.cgi/UserWishList looked outdated (some
mention .16!), and that I could improve it if someone sanity-checked the
result, but nobody responded, so I'm unsure whether to do this, and if
so, how.  Just edit the HTML and send it back to -dev?  Open a ticket?
Hold off and assume it'll get rolled into whatever Daniel has planned?