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IDEMSInternational / R-Instat

A statistics software package powered by R
http://r-instat.org/
GNU General Public License v3.0
38 stars 102 forks source link

Easy-to-Use Software #2868

Open lilyclements opened 7 years ago

lilyclements commented 7 years ago

@africanmathsinitiative/developers I've been trying to have a little think about how to make the software easier to use after a comment on Friday that R-Instat is not "easy to use". I've had a little explore of other softwares for some ways I think they make it easy. I don't know if these ideas weren't implemented for a reason, if this is the case it would be good to know why.

So, as a quick draft to get an idea of what I mean, I think the selectors should be bigger. The software offers data sets with multiple variables and long names, and then I feel the software doesn't accommodate this very well. If the selectors went as wide as the "Add" button, and then we removed the "Add" button, and moved the "Data Options" to below the selector then we can fit in long variable names easier

The "Add" button could move next to receivers. When watching the students with the programme, they often click Add before selecting the correct receiver. I think this is because of the order of if the user wishes to input a variable: (- Go to the left hand side to select the correct dataframe)

Another thing I noticed in other softwares is that they tend to have a bigger preview box (or input box, such as for calculator). I think this is good. Currently, when we have a preview box the information in them can get very long (e.g. if it's a model). I feel as one long line, it can be difficult to see everything at once and makes it seem less clear. Is it possible to have say the input for calculator and preview boxes as a "double line" type so they're longer? I feel that if it is clearer, the layout looks more user-friendly.

Having the Data View and Output Window resizable from the buttons on the top right hand sides of them, or by double clicking the top of the box, causes a lot of issues. I like that they can be re-sized by clicking on the edge of the view boxes and dragging them. The "Minimise" button causes a lot of confusion, however.

I'm going to keep thinking of suggestions and explore other packages further over the next few days. If anyone has any suggestions or comments then do add.

dannyparsons commented 7 years ago

I like this discussion and agree with many of the points. On the issue of the Add button, our current implementation requires the concept of a current receiver, so that the variables available in the selector can change for different receivers. If we want to move the add button to the receivers we have to think how it will be compatible with this.

dannyparsons commented 7 years ago

Your point about not experiencing other software is interesting too. Roger wrote a very nice document way back in the beginning (October 2015) comparing the interface and menus of other stats software. I don't think any of us could appreciate it much at the time but now it would be quite useful to revisit when thinking about "making it easy". I will try to find and forward to everyone.

maxwellfundi commented 7 years ago

@lilyclements This is a good start with these discussions and as Danny has forwarded the document by Roger, we need to revisit the document then have more points of comparison so that we could end up with a structure of making our package easier.

dannyparsons commented 7 years ago

We should consider what we can do about this for 0.4.0 particularly on the size of controls.

lilyclements commented 7 years ago

I also think on the size of grids on dialogs this can be improved. For example, Levels/Labels from memory. When doing SSD work and naming labels, the length of what I wanted to name it was longer than the length of the dialog/grid. This meant I couldn't actually see some of what I was writing so I had to hope for no typos. When there was a typo I would have to re-write it all instead of getting to click and move the focus to the typo since I couldn't see what I was correcting.

Perhaps this is the sort of thing I should write an issue on when I can articulate myself better!

Edit: just saw this is touched on in #2857 so apologies!

dannyparsons commented 7 years ago

@lilyclements would be good to try do a few more of these before 0.4.1. I think the factor controls are now better sizes. Can we make the selector wider to see longer variable names (without making the overall control bigger otherwise all dialogs have to change)? Any other simple things you can think of that could improve ease of use?