Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!philmtl!ray
From: ray@philmtl.philips.ca (Raymond Dunn)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.elm
Subject: A basic Wish List
Message-ID: <1066@philmtl.philips.ca>
Date: 22 Feb 90 21:53:30 GMT
Organization: Philips Electronics Ltd.  Product Group PC.  Montreal.
Lines: 93

I've just recently been trying elm, and although the package has a lot of
good features, I am a little disappointed with the user interface.

Please accept the following as constructive criticisms coming from (too)
many years experience, not just cheap shots.

The version in use is 2.2 PL16.

1)  When saving (s), the messages are flagged with a "D".  This is the same as
    when they are deleted (d).

    There are two things wrong here:

    a) The "s" and "d" keys are adjacent on the keyboard and are commonly
       transposed when typing.  It is a classic user interface design error
       to use two such keys for such different functions, one benign, one
       destructive, ("D" would be a reasonable alternative for "d"), and
       particularly because:

    b) at the end of a mail housekeeping session it is not possible to
       easily determine which messages have been saved and which have been
       deleted without saving - they are both flagged 'D'.

    I would strongly suggest that saved messages be flagged differently from
    deleted ones.  I consider this a serious bug.

2)  The user should be able to configure personal preferences as to how elm
    should dispose of messages when you quit, so that, for example you don't
    have to go through the delete/save/leave-alone dialogue for each
    category.  Again, saved and deleted messages should be clearly
    differentiated.
    I don't see any need for elm to ask you what you want to do with
    messages you haven't touched - it should leave them alone in the
    mailbox.

3)  "<" for "sent", and ">" for "received", are non intuitive.  The opposite
    is intuitive ('tis, 'tisn't....though obviously there is no point in
    arguing this point of personal preference, consider whether keys like
    arrow keys are dangerous to choose in a case like this because they may
    have strong opposite connotations to some users.)

4)  Saving to Mail/sent and Mail/received should be a single keystroke
    command, why not make it *directly* the "<" and ">" keys, rather than
    "s" + "<" + <return>.  The overloading of "<" (or is it ">") for use
    with calendars serves little useful purpose.

5)  Inconsistent use of full screen update mode and scrolling mode under
    different circumstances, particularly but not confined to when the
    folders help scrolls up onto the screen.

    Text is often displayed then immediately erased or the screen redrawn.
    I *think* that the messages I have seen doing this are innocuous, but
    that's not the point.  Do I have confidence that I will not miss a
    message that I should see?

    Screen redraws seem to take place arbitrarily.  The interface doesn't
    have a tight consistent feel.

6)  Mail header generation and editing during mailing and replying.

    There is no doubt in my mind that the best way to handle this is as in
    Rnmail, where the headers are treated as part of the message and you can
    freely edit them.

    I often have to copy the To address out of the body of the message.
    Using elm, I have to work with a paper and pencil to remember what to
    edit into the headers.  Why add a whole new section to the user interface
    (the header input and editing), when the users is already using a
    perfectly good editor of his choice.

    If elm is designed this way to force validity of the headers, then it
    has been done at the expense of user convenience.  Elm can check
    validity after the user has finished editing (Rnmail seems to have no
    problems in this area).

    On the same note, elm ignores References lines in the message being
    replied to.  A paper and pencil must again be laboriously used if I want
    to quote them (or the message copied separately to another file then
    yanked back into the reply).


If any of this has already been discussed already then I apologize in
advance.  Could someone relay the old articles to me?

Are there any features in elm that I have missed that would enable me to
correct the problems that I'm concerned about.

Comments anyone?
-- 
Ray Dunn.                    | UUCP: ray@philmtl.philips.ca
Philips Electronics Ltd.     |       ..!{uunet|philapd|philabs}!philmtl!ray
600 Dr Frederik Philips Blvd | TEL : (514) 744-8200  Ext : 2347 (Phonemail)
St Laurent. Quebec.  H4M 2S9 | FAX : (514) 744-6455  TLX : 05-824090