tain.totalcodex.net

hey. I noticed the post asking about why the Thralldust dl link was broken, and since I have it on my HD I wanted to check to see if anyone else had uploaded it yet. So, I went to the search box and typed in 'Thrall'. Results came back. No 'Thralldust' in the results. Hmmmm.... typed 'ThrallDust' in the box and got a hit. 'That's Odd' I thought. Tried it again 'Thrall' - no hit. 'ThrallDust' - hit.

THEN I noticed the TFL/SB/TWA tabs across the top. doh!

A few thoughts. (here's the search results screen from searching on 'Thrall'.
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1) The top line of info saying I had ONE item name match and 36 'extra' matches seems to conflict with the 'Displaying 4 of 4" results further down. I _understand_ this is saying it is displaying 4 of 4 TFL results, but I don't know if that's obvious. (at least it wasn't to me)

2) The hue changes/color scheme for active/displayed tab (TFL) vs. inactive tab with results(SB) vs. inactive tab with NO results (TWA) aren't obvious/intuitive (at least to me). Light Tan, Dark Tan, Grey don't mean anything to me given the Tain interface uses a watercolory earthtone palette. I know in standard user interfaces, grey often means inactive - but when a button or feature is disabled it is usually 'greyed out' i.e. the button/icon/text is faded, not just colored grey. Since the general tain interface is earthy tones, the grey doesn't stand out as obviously 'greyed out'.

IF the game tabs had the # of search results in them that would draw more attention to them. Or if tabs with no results didn't display at all. I am sure smarter UI people than me can come up with better ideas than these.

Regarding the search counts, I don't have any bright ideas, but I really think the main results count of search results conflicting with the number of results you see on the screen is confusing without a more obvious indication that the "4 of 4" results is for the TFL result subset.



just my opinion of course, and as usual - these are not meant as a criticizm - I heart the Tain, comments are meant only as constructive feedback.

Make a mock-up of how you think it should look, and we'll consider changing it.

Also, I was thinking of just making M2 the default tab (if it has results), which may make the issue irrelevant for the most case..

Myrd wrote:Also, I was thinking of just making M2 the default tab (if it has results), which may make the issue irrelevant for the most case..

I'd vote for that - or a preference setting (which would take more work).

I think the fact that the tabs all have a "bottom border" makes it harder to tell what you are looking at too, instead of having the selected one knocked out so it appears as if it is in front.

My two cents.

well, I've included a rough idea of what I was imagining, BUT BUT BUT... I think if you made M2 the default _and_ changed the active tab graphic to look like part of the current 'page' that would probably be enough of a clue.

I think baak nailed it - more than the colors of the different tabs not being meaningful in and of themselves, it's the active tab not looking like it's connected to the page. To tell you the truth (newb!) I didn't even notice that the active tab color changed to match the page so I COULD tell what I was looking at at a glance - the underline under the tabs made the tabs look like a free-standing navigation bar to me.

here's a rough draft of what I was talking about - but I am not convinced it would be worth the effort.

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It looks like a limewire search... Copyright infringement! Sorry Ill go back to making less nonsensical posts.