Android alpha -833 with experimental mobile components change

[Thomas Pfeiffer]

Hi Rick,
thank you for the feedback! 
See my replies inline.

On Freitag, 12. Februar 2016 08:17:04 CET Rick Walsh wrote:

> I've had a very little play with this in the time it takes to eat my
> breakfast.  Tested on a Galaxy S6 - a reasonably large phone, but
> definitely not tablet/phablet sized.
> 
> I think that these buttons are far more intuitive than the central action
> button. My initial reaction to the central standard mobilecomponents action
> button, like most people, was "what's that?".  Swiping a page is expected,
> but not a button.
> 
> Having said that, it didn't take long to get used to swiping the central
> button, and it is easy and comfortable to use. It's also very efficient:
> one button has three actions (swipe left, swipe right, click). The user
> just has to know what to do with it.

Thank you! At some point I had feared that users might not see the benefit we 
had intended for them to get from this, so I am relieved to hear that this is 
not the case (at least not for everyone).
 
> With the left and right arrow buttons, it's obvious what they do, but I
> find it a bit cramped to reach the left button (I'm left handed). It's
> doable, but not comfortable. I assume many right-handers will have the same
> issue with the right button, but that's rarely needed in Subsurface-mobile.
> I actually find it more comfortable to stretch to reach the upper-left
> non-action button to open the menu than to use the on at the bottom-left of
> the screen.
> 
> I agree with Dirk that the left/right buttons would be better if mostly
> transparent, and should hide when disabled. I expected the slightly
> greyed-out left button to do something.

Yes, both Marco and I fully agree! Both changes are already pushed to master, 
so you'll see them in the next build :)
 
> I'm not sure if it'd be creating a Frankenstein, but I think it's worth at
> least thinking about having both options. Then, you could open the left
> menu by either: (a) click button on left, (b) swipe button on left to the
> right, (c) swipe central action button to the right. The right menu would
> be opened similarly. Compared to the single central action button, it
> wastes screen real estate (as does the current testing build), but the page
> contents I focus on is almost always in the upper two-thirds.

Since the action button also has the main function to execute an action, there 
isn't really a downside to keeping the additional function of opening the 
drawers, so that will be kept.

As for the discoverability: We are aware that it has to be taught to users 
somehow, we're still figuring out the best way to do that.

We have decided to only show the action button when there is an action, 
however, so where there is no main action, you'd still have to use the buttons 
in the corners.

I'm looking forward to more feedback from you and others when you had the time 
to get used to this new interaction.
 
> > And I updated things to a build 833 which just adds a little improvement
> > so the dive list can be scrolled up above the ActionButton and arrow
> > handles.
> > 
> > I tested 832, so can't comment on that change.

I'm also looking forward to feedback on this change!
 
> Cheers,
> 
> Rick

Cheers,
Thomas