Hi!
My name is Thomas de Lima.
I'm a computer engineering student from Brazil. I want to discuss more the
idea of redesigning PMA, because I want to be sure I understood it
correctly.
Design is not only about changing color or shapes in the user interface, but
also about changing how the user interacts with the application, towards
improving usability. So, the "User interface cleanup" project needs to be
codeveloped with the AJAX team. Is that right?
I read an email from our indian colleague Anirvana Mishra, excited about
ajaxifying PMA. But then Michal answered that he should pick one specific
area to improve, cause there's too much functionality in PMA. Well, as a
database manager, the PMA should be lightweight and "usable". For example,
it takes a great deal of HTML download and clicks to find and edit someone's
data in a huge personnel table. AJAX could solve both problems by opening a
quickedit option on a browse table's row, which could be quickly found by an
AJAX filter on top. So I think one of the "User interface cleanup" project
goals should be study of which features need to be ajaxified or changed, or
whatever, not about picking, before a deeper study, an area to improve.
For this purpose I wish to apply as an GSoCer to improve the PMA user
interface, cause I frequently use it to manage my databases remotely. Of
course PMA's usability now is excellent, as everything is intuitively put in
place, but it feels soooo Web1.0, so static.
Thanks,
thomas.