RE: Sortable Tools List

 

Hi Shadi, Charles and everybody.

> > Other than that I would have an option for platforms in the "main" 
> > version  - all (default), web, win, mac, linux, others...
> 
> I'm not sure what you mean by "main version". For every tool 
> displayed, all the features *known about it in the database* 
> are displayed (you can sort the database but there is always 
> only one view on the data). So if there is no platform 
> information for a tool, it is because this information is not 
> yet available in the database. I've flagged this issue.
> 

I think that what Charles means by "main version" is just the main page
[http://www.w3.org/WAI/ER/tools/] with the customize list option (sort
by tool, vendor and release date).

In this case, I agree with Charles in the opinion that there are some
interesting options that should be avalaible in this page and not in a
additional search page.

For example, when people ask us about our tool they want to know about:

-Platform support (this is the first question Unix and Mac users always
ask)
-Language support (when we show the tool in other countries people
always ask "Is it avalaible in <put here the language>?")
-License model (more in detail, they always ask "Is it free of charge?")

And not so frequently:

-Accessibility of the tool (normally about the compability with screen
readers)
-Guidelines support ("does it work with the <put here other standard
different from WCAG 1.0>?")

So, I think that if users usually want to know about this specific
features, put them (al least the first three) at the first level search
(not in an advanced search with ten options).


Some additional thoughts:

I find the "sort by vendor name" option confusing, because you get a
list wich is alphabetically ordered by vendor but with the name of the
tool in first place.

I think that a default "all" option for the platform is not a good idea.
It is supossed this option means that the tool should work in all
platforms (web included) and I think that it's not the "default platform
requirements" of most users.

Regards,

Carlos.

Received on Monday, 10 October 2005 14:06:13 UTC