[Adium-devl] Privacy user interface

[disposable at infinitenexus.com]

As I noted in the thread on this subject recently in the forums, I  
believe at a glance access to the account(s)' state is important.

For example, a list of accounts (collapsable perhaps?) would indicate  
"Allow All" "Allow None" "Allow Selected" or whatever so you could  
base judgments for contacts based off this criteria as well without  
the need to keep it in your own memory or repeatedly open the  
preferences window to check each account individually, which would  
rapidly get annoying and become a poor workflow.

Also, would this perference not also be eligible for the Personal tab  
perhaps? I could see people wanting a uniform solution across all  
accounts and that's the purpose of this tab, with accounts being able  
to override.

That's my $0.02, adjust accordingly.

- brian 'bgannin'

On Jun 2, 2006, at 7:34 AM, Kiel Gillard wrote:

> Hi guys!
>
> I have given some thought to an easier to use implementation to the  
> Block List Editor (BLE) recently and am emailing you to get some  
> feedback from my ideas and possibly finish the UI for privacy in  
> Adium, as it seems the interface between the protocols and the UI  
> has been implemented by Augie.
>
> Currently, all the privacy settings are located in the BLE window.  
> However, I feel that the purpose of the BLE is to add or remove  
> denied contacts. The privacy settings for the account (for example,  
> "allow anyone") seems to belong in the respective account's  
> preferences, as this setting is not likely to change with  
> frequency. Also, I find the account privacy states in the pop up  
> button difficult to understand by just glancing at them.
>
> I have determined how to overcome these problems that I have  
> identified. I felt the only real account privacy states, as far as  
> the user is concerned, is: "Allow anyone to chat with me" and  
> "Allow contacts to chat with me". Because a user would not change  
> this preference frequently, I felt it was more appropriate for this  
> to go in Adium's Preferences. I would like to suggest that a user  
> be presented with each option in the form of radio buttons. This  
> preference would be available in the Preferences > Accounts >  
> {{account}} > Privacy tab.
>
> The advantage of this approach is that for protocols such as MSN,  
> who do not provide users this flexibility with account privacy, we  
> can simplify the privacy settings by not having privacy options  
> visible. If we stay with the current implementation, a user would  
> attempt to change the privacy state of an MSN account which is not  
> available in the MSN protocol and confuse users.
>
> Remembering that the purpose of the BLE is to add or remove denied  
> contacts, I figured the window could be split into two tables: the  
> leftmost table could list accounts and the second list contacts  
> blocked in the selected account. Augie's sheet can still remain.
>
> The foreseeable problem with this interface is that Adium will have  
> to be careful passing around account privacy states back to the  
> protocol API. Because the UI is simplifying the privacy for the  
> user, Adium's going to need to check if an account has any blocked  
> contacts and inform the API of the correct state, otherwise privacy  
> settings will not be respected by the protocol. For example, if I  
> chose "Allow contacts to chat with me" in the preferences, but had  
> denied a few contacts, then I will need to provide the protocol API  
> the account privacy state PRIVACY_ALLOW_USERS instead of  
> PRIVACY_ALLOW_CONTACTLIST.
>
> Any thoughts/suggestions/criticisms? Be blunt and/or harsh ;-)
>
> I would be more than happy to implement the rant that I gave above  
> if Augie or anyone else doesn't have a claim on it already. I felt  
> that I should discuss my ideas before I sit down, plan and  
> implement them (especially if it's already being done by someone  
> else). Can I have a go? I guess I'm more asking Augie than anyone  
> else. I'd love to work on this feature.
>
> Thanks!
>
> Kiel :-)
> "Love does not consist in gazing at each other but looking together  
> in the same direction."
> Antoine de Saint-Exupery
>
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