Suggestion: Reorder icons

[Sodapop 0]

Biggest to smallest:

 

••••Stack

•••Notebook

••Note

•Tag

 

The icon bar at the left seems counterintuitive in the placement of notebook and note icons; notes should be below notebooks.

 

Having just started using web beta and not being familiar with the icons—and moving very quickly—I keep hitting notes when I mean to hit notebooks.

 

Hey, while we're at it, how about a Stack icon? I'd like that!

 

Thanks!

 

[jefito 5,589]

I don't think that the icon list is explicitly meant to expose any kind of "biggest-to-smallest" ordering; it's just a lit of tools.

 

Seems like Shortcuts should be an important item; I can't quibble with that placement

 

The All Notes icon is only occasionally useful to me, but once in awhile you need it; not sure that where it's placed is ideal, but it's gotta be somewhere.

 

Stacks are exposed in the Notebooks list, and since they're tightly integrated, I don't see a need for a separate icon for that.

[Sodapop 0]

Those tools gotta be placed in an order that I can grab and go! And I have a need for harmony in my design.

 

In any file tree (if that's what they're called) you would see this:

 

-Stack 1

    --Notebook 1

    --Notebook 2

              ---Note 1

              ---Note 2

              ---Note 3

    --Notebook 3

 

So why list icons that are placed right where that tree usually is—and will be running alongside a tree of snippets that works in that very fashion—in a different order?

 

Granted, this is just .002% of an overall masterful piece of GUI design. But these little details count, right?

[jefito 5,589]

As notebook nesting with stacks can only go one-deep; I don't see much reason to expose stacks separately.

 

File browsers come in different shapes and sizes; there's no fixed standard across all operating systems, or even within. For example, Windows Explorer doesn't expose a single "file tree" hierarchy that you suggest; by default, it's a two-panel system, with folder hierarchy on the left, and contents of the current folder on the right.

 

Again, the icon bar isn't meant to represent your stack/notebook/note architecture directly: neither shortcuts (these are essentially search filters) nor tags (which cut across any notebook structure) fit into that scheme, but they *are* important nonetheless. The icon bar is meant to be a collection of tools that help you to navigate your account. I don't see any particular lack of harmony there.

 

I haven't heard of any "grab and go" principle of UI design, but there's nothing preventing you from becoming familiar with the layout, as you use it more and more.

[Sodapop 0]

I getcha. I'm sure I'll get used to it. Here's my last ditch since I can only make 1 more post today. Fun stuff. I love thinking about design and don't always get to do it, so thanks for engaging.

 

This question can be flowed like this:

 

Do items in a column have a natural order that all users agree on?

A note is in a notebook; so it should be below it when in a column. Maybe I'm a goofy footer on this, but I kinda doubt it. I'm looking at all my file browsers and they order in this way when columns are involved. Newspapers, books, anything that lists a column on a page typically orders in this way. So I'm going with 'yes'. Therefore...

 

If it's true that this order exists, is it then necessary to apply this order to a column of icons that runs adjacent to another column with this order?

Yes. Because otherwise there's going to be a split-second mental correction that has to occur before selecting that notebook icon. My brain would have to pull away from the more important task I'm occupied with to quickly say 'hey, no, it's opposite here' until I get used to it (assuming using menus in other places doesn't switch my brain back all over again). The very principle of intuitive design is eliminating those overrides your brain has to perform to make all the controls disappear for the user. I guess that's what I meant by 'grab and go' earlier... It's staying focused on the surgery instead of stopping every second to think about where the damned scapel is. It's dumping what your brain doesn't need so it can dedicate more to the primary task; it's why we're all using Evernote in the first place!

 

But you're absolutely right that they'll disappear eventually. The driver's controls in a car probably wouldn't be considered intuitive if just introduced today and yet they disappear for us. But get in a car where the driver's side is reversed (especially a stick shift!) and you're brain is now being dedicated to switching the order instead of the primary task of navigating the road. Granted, in this case it's more on the level of switching your blinker lever with the wiper lever

 

...But details are everything.

 

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On the stacks: I have a ton of them so thought for a second it might be quicker for me to dial down to where I want to go if they were separate at first. But most users probably don't have this issue so adding another icon wouldn't make sense. Agreed. We want minimal icons.

[jefito 5,589]

Thank you for engaging. The Evernote folks do read these posts, so maybe they'll pick up something from this topic. You can jump in again tomorrow; the 5-post/first day thing is an anti-spam measure.