Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

Well, as I prommised, I've started a BLOG, where I'll collect all of mine and your (if you want and allow :) ) thoughts about current maemo UI improvements. I've already wrote the first chapter about Tray. You're welcome to read, discuss and suggest :) And maybe Maemo team guys will someday read it and even use some of issues :). I think you can freely post your thoughts here. Thank you.

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

The title of the blog is misspelled. It says "emprovements" instead of "improvements". Other than that I think its a great idea and I will be eager to read your posts. I'm setting up an RSS feed to it right now. Great idea!

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

Aw, thank you very much! Dunno how i've made this misspell =) And thanks for appreciation!

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

Along with 'great', I think 'overdue' should apply to your choice for a blog topic!

An item I hope you address sometime, is the concept of UI 'modes'. I don't know the official names, but if I mention 'stylus', 'finger' or 'button', I think most tablet users know what I mean.

I'm familiar with one discussion of UI modes, that arose in a thread about runaway scrolling when using the d-pad button (which I just found a workaround for: I turned images off in the browser to reduce the cpu load).

Personally, I've never touched the screen with my finger, except accidently. Sometimes I would like to use just the buttons, since it only requires one hand, but that's frequently nott possible.

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

Well, you can address any idea as well! It's not only blog but a compilation of great UI improvement ideas, that're not difficult to be done. The more people are participating - the more ideas we disuss - the more user friendly ITs become! So feel free to develop and describe your idea here and I'll illustrate it and repost to the blog. Get in!

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

Jimminy Crimminy, can we please have a clock in the tray?

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

You should submit it to planet@maemo.org and get it syndicated on http://planet.maemo.org/

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

We could write about those modes, but if you want to see how it's to be done properly, I'd suggest a visit to OpenMoko. Their UI specifically supports different interaction modes, up to and including writing applets/applications for one specific input mode.

OpenMoko is maturing really slowly, but, in view of the attention the developers are giving to their baby, it will almost certainly be worth the wait.

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

I have just published a new post about enhancements to the OS2008 browser, including finger scrollbar and a better way to go back/forward in your recent history, including some mock-up images.

Hope the Maemo team is reading!

Re: Tablet UI improvements blog.
 

A lot of the built-in applications/applets don't give an update to the display very well (assuming the problem is in the UI) as they will pop up a dialog box/window and when it is removed, the underlying display is whited-out for an extended period until the UI can catch up. It looks hokey and makes you wonder if maybe the application is locked up.

A very nice thing to have would be hooks in the UI so that the pop-up keyboards (stylus and finger) can be made available through X11 hooks (to things like dosbox). It seems ludicrous to have to use xkbd, xvkbd and matchbox-keyboard to communicate on a simple UI function!

Speaking of the browser...
How about having the bookmarks stay in the order that you arrange them instead of sorted?
Also the History list has never worked for me...its always empty.