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roundware / roundware-android

Android client for Roundware contributory audio platform
http://roundware.org
GNU General Public License v3.0
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Remove HomeActivity #12

Open multidynamic opened 9 years ago

multidynamic commented 9 years ago

Matthew Adler created an issue 2014-12-29 The home activity is redundant. Remove it. Ensure all responsibilities of this activity are moved to ListenActivity. Related to issue #10

:heavy_multiplication_x: A major issue

Halsey Burgund REPO OWNER 2014-12-29 Do I understand this correctly to mean that the entire initial screen of the app with the Listen and Speak buttons on it is to be removed? Obviously, FAM can have whatever they want for this app, but since the hope is (as far as I understand) that this app will become the updated version of the example RW app that will be shared (after some sanitization, of course), I ask that the home activity not be fully removed, but rather bypassed for FAM. I see how this screen could be considered redundant from a pure functionality standpoint, but it has served as a very useful entry point to the app for people who don't know what to expect, so I'd like it to be part of the standard example app. And eosrei, assuming this design change happens, it should be also done in the iOS app. Has there been a group discussion about this with Jason/Sheila/etc? It has not been communicated to me directly wrt to the iOS app and will involve some development time that needs to be scheduled on my end. We can discuss offline...

13rac1 commented 9 years ago

I have a potential solution to this issue.

The problem is the MainActivity (Home) is mostly redundant. MainActivity allows the user to go to the ListenActivity, SpeakActivity, and get help. ListenActivity does already the first two and could easily have a new button for the third. MainActivity could almost simply be deleted and replaced by ListenActivity, but it provides one important feature. It introduces the user to the two major features of Roundware: Listen and Speak.

ListenActivity provides access to both features, but, well, it's ListenActivity. It's primary purpose is Listening, so the link to SpeakActivity is given a prominent but small icon in the bottom right. This makes it look to the new user as if Speak were a minor feature (I believe this is @hburgund's concern with just removing it.)

I'd like to float the idea of replacing MainActivity with a new IntroActivity. This functionality could be apply to both iOS and Android. IntroActivity would introduce new users to the available features, while not hassling returning users with a pointless Main Menu system. Of course, returning users could access IntroActivity again if they wanted, but it wouldn't be forced on them.

I have an example! DuoLingo (I'm learning Portuguese using it right now) was the number one app in 2013 for both Android and iOS, so I feel it can be used as a good example of best practices. DouLingo has a useful and short introduction tutorial showing off the base functionality to train the user. When the user runs the app a second time, they are taken directly to the "meat" of the functionality. Here are some screenshots! This what you see when you start the App the first time, it's a View Flipper with Swipe: 2014-12-30-12-02-222014-12-30-12-02-28 2014-12-30-12-02-352014-12-30-12-02-42

We don't have support for User Accounts yet, so we'd just say "Get Started!" or something.

hburgund commented 9 years ago

We would have to get into some more specifics with the design and functionality of this before making final decisions, but I think it is a great idea to explore more. @eosrei, you are correct about my concern of minimizing "Speak" functionality and this, if designed well, would certainly take care of that.

Also, having some kind of introduction/demo/how to use this app is something I've talked to other museums about and is a good idea, but as suggested, only needs to come up the initial time automatically. I will contend that most people who use RW apps will probably not use them very frequently, so having a very simple and clear intro is likely to be a big win.

So, lots of promise here. We just need to design something nice and try it out. That said, really doing this right is definitely some significant effort that is not in the scope of phase 2, so perhaps we do some prep work for a better implementation (ie only one screen mimicking the current home screen) and build in the only-display-this-on-app-launch-the-first-time functionality? IDK what's reasonable...?