Clarifying Slide Show
I can see that the new Slide Show feature in version 2 brings additional flexibility and performance. I've spent some time exploring it over the last few days and I think it will be really useful. However, that additional flexibility means that it's more complex than the previous version. Even after going over the manual several times, I'm still confused about some aspects of the process. I think I'm getting there now, but to be honest the manual wasn't all that helpful: it explains some of the steps to be taken, but some of the implications of the various options aren't always clear. (Accordingly, I may have got some of what follows wrong or missed easy solutions - if so, forgive me...)
For example: I think I've understood that Slide Show icon at the top of the screen (cmd-2) runs whatever is the current Slide Show. So, for example, it will run the Slide Show attached to Stack A, even though you've got Stack B highlighted at the time. To run a Slide Slow on Stack B, you have to choose one of the New Slide Show options (menu or icon at the bottom of the screen.) If this is the first time Stack B has been 'slide showed', it will bring up a settings box, otherwise it will set up a new Slide Show using previous settings (where from is not clear...). Then this Stack B slideshow will become the current show, which you access in future from cmd-2 or the icon in the top middle - even if you've got Stack A highlighted... In which case you'd select New Slideshow with Selected Stack to run the old Stack A slideshow again.
Such a scenario (wanting to switch between slideshows) is I would have thought very common - I want to study three languages, but in separate chunks. So I will always be switching between slide shows. The problem is, there seems to be no information available about the current slideshow, or about the settings with which 'New Slideshow from x' will run. How do I know which slideshow will be activated by cmd-2? And how do I know what its settings are - e.g. does this slideshow have 'default to correct' on or not? How do I know what settings will apply when I choose 'New Slide Show from x...'?
The settings box will only appear the first time you run a slideshow on a stack, it seems. So, if I want to run the show on the same stack a second time, but this time with different settings I think I have to use Custom Slide Show. Then, presumably, if I wanted to change the settings back, I'd have to use Custom Slide Show again? This has the potential to be quite confusing - you're basically never really sure what settings apply to the Slide Show you're running or about to run. You actually end up using Custom Slideshow every time because that's the only way you can see the settings in advance.
So my first suggestion for a potential upgrade is that when a Slide Show is running, the settings that have been applied are available - to be shown if required in the same way that the statistics are, perhaps. This information should also be available from the New Slide Show menus so I know exactly what I'll be getting before I select each option - and give me the opportunity to change them if I want.
Secondly, it would be useful to be able to apply standard settings to the Slide Shows, based on various Custom options - essentially, allowing the user to save Custom settings to a Slide Show template, which he/she could then apply to any stack for a new slideshow.
I appreciate that these suggestions would be for future upgrades, but I think there's one thing you could do quickly to assist new users with getting to grips with the new features. That is to update the manual to provide a walkthrough of how to use the Side Show features with more than one stack.
You already provide the sample templates: it would be really useful to see a simple narrative with screen shots explaining in detail the steps needed to set up a slide show first on "Language", then on "Italian Art" etc, with various settings selected, and what happens when you press the cmd-2 current slideshow button and so on.
I would have found such a walkthrough very useful and I think others would as well.
I hope these suggestions are useful
Regards
David
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Support Staff 1 Posted by drewmccormack on 14 Nov, 2011 03:28 PM
Hi David,
There is an intro video on our site, but it doesn't go very deep.
You may be getting confused because you are trying to map the new slideshows to the old ones. They are very different. Previously slideshows were basically disposable, though you could sometimes resume them. Now, the current slideshow continues to exist, even between quits, until you make a new slideshow. You only replace a slideshow when you choose a New Slideshow menu or button. When you select the second tab at the top, you are simply switching to the slideshow mode, not creating a new slideshow.
So it isn't really that complicated: there is only one slideshow at a time, and you can replace it by using New Slideshow.
We have a series of standard slideshows built in. They are designed to make it quick and easy to make a slideshow, and cover the most important cases. If you are a control freak, and want to configure other aspects, you can use the Custom… option, but it takes longer, and is more of an advanced feature.
There is a reason why we don't allow you to change settings during a slideshow: the settings are purely for creating the slideshow. Changing them half way wouldn't make any sense. You would effectively be making a new slideshow.
Hope that helps.
Kind regards,
Drew
2 Posted by David Bertensha... on 14 Nov, 2011 05:00 PM
Hi Drew,
Thanks for the clarification… I think I'd understood most of that.
But I'm not sure it's quite as simple to a new and in my case possibly stupid user as to someone who's been living and breathing it for several months…. For a start, you've chosen the 'most important cases', which is great, but how do people know whether they're appropriate in individual circumstances if you don't make it clear what the defaults are?
Secondly: when I first chose 'New Slideshow / Notes in Selected Stacks", I'm fairly sure I was given the settings box and chose various options, including 'Default Grade is Wrong", "Recently Incorrect First" etc. Those were my best guesses at the time as to the options I'd like for that occasion. Now, after some use, I'm not so sure. I'd like to revisit them and perhaps tweak them, for example, to change the presentation order. But no matter which stack I choose, even newly created ones, I don't seem to be able to get the settings dialogue again when I select 'Notes in Selected Stacks'. That's quite apart from the fact that I might want different settings for different stacks.
Wait a minute - I've just gone through everything again… I'd missed that you can reset the settings, but you have to be in slideshow mode to do it. Click the 'restart icon' (circular arrow) and you'll be given the settings dialogue. The options you choose will then persist until you reset them again.
So you can change the defaults whilst in slide show mode, but not before you select the new slideshow. That's sort of OK, but it's not what I expected (my fault, no doubt).
BTW, I've included my sudden realisation of what to do above, rather than rewriting the email, because I think it shows the thought processes of a new user trying to get to grips with something that doesn't work the way they expect.
The manual says under Configuring Slideshows "You can customize your slideshows in many different ways, including which notes to include, what order they should be shown, and how the facets of each note should be ordered. Usually, once you have settled on settings you like, you can leave them relatively unchanged when starting new slideshows."
It doesn't really say that you can only do this from the slideshow mode after you restart the slideshow. (Or does choosing a Custom slideshow change some defaults too? It's not clear.)
I do think it would really help people if you made the process more explicit in the manual - a walkthrough with pictures / video really would be helpful - and possibly a note to say that it doesn't work the same way as before. And I do still think it would be useful to display the current settings somewhere, instead of having to start a new slideshow to find out what they were.
Many thanks
David
Support Staff 3 Posted by drewmccormack on 14 Nov, 2011 06:34 PM
You can change slideshow settings by refreshing the slideshow in the slideshow mode, as you found, or by choosing a Custom… slideshow. I think it should be pretty obvious that if you choose 'Custom', you are saying you want to customize the settings.
We may well make a series of screencasts, but the help pages in apps have to follow a certain format, and don't usually include tutorials or walkthroughs. We may put that on the web site.
Thanks for the feedback.
Kind regards,
Drew
4 Posted by David Bertensha... on 14 Nov, 2011 06:57 PM
Hi Drew,
It's obvious that 'Custom' will customise something, but what exactly?
When I looked at it, I could see several possibilities:
Custom is a one-off thing. When you choose a New Slide option the custom changes are dropped in favour of presets.
Custom changes the defaults for some settings (which ones?) for the previously selected New Slide Option
Custom changes the defaults for some settings (which ones?) for all New Slide Options
I suspect the answer isn't the first one, but even after your reply, I still don't know which settings persist or whether the second or third option is correct.
The point is that there are several 'obvious' things a Custom… dialogue can do. You've made several no doubt very sensible decisions and assumptions in designing the program, but they're not the only ones that could have been made, and unless you tell us, it can be quite confusing!
I'm not being difficult, Drew: I tried very hard to understand it before posting my query and I read the manual a lot. I just don't think it's as intuitive to users as it is to you who've been so steeped in it.
No problem with a walkthrough being on the web site rather than in the manual - perhaps a link in the Help Menu as well?
Regards
David
Support Staff 5 Posted by drewmccormack on 15 Nov, 2011 07:46 AM
Hi David,
I do think you are obsessing on it too much. We persist every setting that we logically can. If you select a standard slideshow, certain settings change to match that slideshow, but we change the minimum possible.
In general, basic settings change a lot, and advanced settings don't, but I'm not sure if that holds in every case.
We designed the app so that you wouldn't have to think about this. If you want total control, use the custom option.
We can think about whether the table in Help can include a column for persistence, but I actually think this will just confuse most people.
Best to choose the slideshow based on your goals. You don't need to know the ugly details. Believe me, they are ugly, and that's why we don't want to describe them in intricate detail.
Kind regards,
Drew
6 Posted by David Bertensha... on 15 Nov, 2011 09:13 AM
HI Drew,
I don't think I'm obsessing, I'm trying to help make the program a little more intuitive for new users, based on my experience. I've gone into some detail simply because our discussion has moved on, not because I think all the details should go into the manual. You keep saying things like "Custom... should be obvious" and I'm trying to show you the assumptions you've made aren't necessarily clear from the outside, which can lead to confusion when things don't happen as the user expects.
Basically, I started off with your 'just press the button' approach, and it didn't do quite what I thought it would. So I read the manual, and that didn't quite explain what I was seeing.
It would have saved me some time at the beginning if there had been a couple of sentences explaining the concepts a little more clearly. You'd done a good job boiling it down in some of these posts - why not put them in the manual. All I'm suggesting is a couple of changes in the Slideshow page, after the paragraph beginning "To start a slideshow…."
Something like (obviously to be tidied up…)
"Please note: Slide shows work differently from previous versions. There is only one slide show at any one time, and you will always return to it when you enter Slide Show mode, no matter which stack you are currently viewing in Library mode. If you want to change the settings for the slide show - for example, to study a different stack, or to change the order of the cards - you must start a new one, using the Study / New Slideshow menu (also available from the icon in the bottom centre of the screen in Library Mode).
"The New Slide Show menu gives you several pre-set options for the most common cases, but you can make more detailed changes using the custom option. You can also access the settings dialogue from the 'Restart' icon in Slide Show mode. Changes you make in the settings dialogue will then become the defaults for any new slide shows until you change them again. Your new settings will also affect the pre-sets, unless this would clash with the logic of the pre-set. Please see our website for a short walkthrough of setting up different slideshows for the sample cases."
BTW, the next sentence in the manual, "When you begin a new slide show, you are presented with a settings panel." was the one which caused the most confusion to me at the beginning. It's misleading - you only seem to get the settings box the FIRST time you create a new slideshow. Every time after that, even if I changed stacks, it went straight into the show itself. That's why I started wondering how to make changes and what the relationship was between Custom and the pre-sets.
Regards
David
Support Staff 7 Posted by drewmccormack on 15 Nov, 2011 09:53 AM
Hi David,
I think a lot of the info you mention is already in the help pages. I suspect you only looked at one or two pages about slideshows, but there is quite a bit there. For example
"To start a slideshow, you enter the study mode by going to the second tab in the toolbar at the top of the main window. Once a new slideshow has started, Mental Case ensures it remains in existence until you finish it or choose to start a new slideshow, even if you quit and relaunch the application. You are free to move in and out of the slideshow as you choose. Your progress will be stored so you can continue at any time."
and
"You can customize your slideshows in many different ways, including which notes to include, what order they should be shown, and how the facets of each note should be ordered. Usually, once you have settled on settings you like, you can leave them relatively unchanged when starting new slideshows."
There is a page that you get to from the main page that shows lists the main slideshow topics.
Hope that helps.
Kind regards,
Drew
8 Posted by David Bertensha... on 15 Nov, 2011 10:21 AM
Drew,
Of course I read those paragraphs - I've read all the slideshow pages several times. But they're on different pages and they don't really explain the behaviour I found. To explain why would get me accused of being obsessive again… ;-)
I've tried in previous posts tried to explain why it caused me a lot of confusion - I read the help files and actually reinstalled the program (having wiped out the caches and preferences just to reset everything back to zero) to try and make the program follow what the help file says should happen (and it still didn't). I've suggested a slight tweak to the manual wording that would have removed that confusion for me and may help others in future.
Bottom line: it's your program, I'm just trying to help… ;-)
Best wishes
David
Support Staff 9 Posted by drewmccormack on 15 Nov, 2011 10:43 AM
OK, thanks for pointing out the problem in the wording. That actually does derive from earlier betas where there were no standard slideshows. We'll fix that.
Kind regards,
Drew
10 Posted by David on 20 Nov, 2011 09:41 AM
Hi Drew,
Just installed version 2.1 and seen you've updated the Manual. I think that makes it a lot clearer, and thanks for listening!
David
drewmccormack closed this discussion on 20 Nov, 2011 10:00 AM.