Address book problems

[Kavey]

Zimbra 4 (downloaded and installed today) on Debian 3.1.

zcs-4.0.0_GA_303.DEBIAN3.1.tar.gz
upgraded from
zcs-4.0.0_RC1_272.DEBIAN3.1.tgz

I am wondering if these are bugs, design choices, or if it's just my setup.

#1 the search doesn't appear to work very well. in many instances it's only exact word patterns. For example a search for "jo" will not return "john smith" although "john" or "smith" would work.

#2 The alphabet letters appear to function on a less than or equal to. i.e. if I have 4 contacts, George, John, Paul and Ringo. The all appear for each letter until the one after their name. "F" would show them all. "K" would only show Paul and Ringo.

#3 Backspace is a little touchy. While playing with the search, I hit the backspace thinking I was going to delete the search I just typed, and I deleted the contact. Actually the first time I did it, I wasn't sure what occured. The contact didn't even end up in the Trash. It was gone. The second time, I deliberately tried, and the contact did go to the Trash.

#4 undeleted contacts don't disappear from trash. Other than switching to the address book that the contact was deleted from, there's no indication that the item was actually undeleted. it shows it there in the Trash until I change from the Trash and back again.

[pshah]

Originally Posted by Kavey

#1 the search doesn't appear to work very well. in many instances it's only exact word patterns. For example a search for "jo" will not return "john smith" although "john" or "smith" would work.

This works as designed. We currently dont "do" partial searches although it has been requested as an enhancement. Feel free to vote for it here .

Originally Posted by Kavey

#2 The alphabet letters appear to function on a less than or equal to. i.e. if I have 4 contacts, George, John, Paul and Ringo. The all appear for each letter until the one after their name. "F" would show them all. "K" would only show Paul and Ringo.

This works as designed. Although we very well could have limited the search results to only those that matched the letter, it seemed more useful to show the chosen letter and all letters thereafter. You may not agree with this and maybe there is something in the UI that can be improved (i.e. distinguish contacts that did match vs. those that did not?)

Originally Posted by Kavey

#3 Backspace is a little touchy. While playing with the search, I hit the backspace thinking I was going to delete the search I just typed, and I deleted the contact. Actually the first time I did it, I wasn't sure what occured. The contact didn't even end up in the Trash. It was gone. The second time, I deliberately tried, and the contact did go to the Trash.

This definitely sound like a bug. Usually the section of the app that currently has focus will be distinctively hilited so the user should be able to tell which section will get the keyboard event when entered. For example, if you just try hitting tab several times, you should see the focus moving from one section to another. If you've found a bug with this where it is unclear which section has focus, then please file a bug with reproducible steps.

Originally Posted by Kavey

#4 undeleted contacts don't disappear from trash. Other than switching to the address book that the contact was deleted from, there's no indication that the item was actually undeleted. it shows it there in the Trash until I change from the Trash and back again.

Known bug: http://bugzilla.zimbra.com/show_bug.cgi?id=8258

HTH.

[schemers]

We actually do partial searches now, you just have to use a trailing "*". For example: "Jo*" should work.

[Kavey]

Originally Posted by schemers

We actually do partial searches now, you just have to use a trailing "*". For example: "Jo*" should work.

But not prepending *? Doesn't appear so.

Originally Posted by pshah

This works as designed. Although we very well could have limited the search results to only those that matched the letter, it seemed more useful to show the chosen letter and all letters thereafter. You may not agree with this and maybe there is something in the UI that can be improved (i.e. distinguish contacts that did match vs. those that did not?)

I guess that makes sense, but it certain seemed confusing at first.

Originally Posted by pshah

This definitely sound like a bug. Usually the section of the app that currently has focus will be distinctively hilited so the user should be able to tell which section will get the keyboard event when entered. For example, if you just try hitting tab several times, you should see the focus moving from one section to another. If you've found a bug with this where it is unclear which section has focus, then please file a bug with reproducible steps.

The focus is definitely not spot on clear, but I do see the difference when I pay attention (but how many users really do that? . But the biggest problem was how easy it was to accidentally delete the contact. I guess what happened is that I did a search (typing the search and hitting enter), it returned a result, I hit backspace thinking it would erase my search text, in this instance I guess the search updated moving the contact to the trash, but still displaying it as it likely searches the trash too. Hitting it twice resulted in it being removed from the trash. So when I hit backspace twice trying to erase my search, it permanently erased the contact.

[pshah]

Well, not sure how much more clearer we can make the focus fields. Instead, we may ask for confirmation if you hit backspace/delete via keyboard by default. That should give users a chance to backout if they're unaware of the focus...

[gihrig]

Originally Posted by Kavey
#2 The alphabet letters appear to function on a less than or equal to. i.e. if I have 4 contacts, George, John, Paul and Ringo. The all appear for each letter until the one after their name. "F" would show them all. "K" would only show Paul and Ringo.

Originally posted by pshah
This works as designed. Although we very well could have limited the search results to only those that matched the letter, it seemed more useful to show the chosen letter and all letters thereafter. You may not agree with this and maybe there is something in the UI that can be improved (i.e. distinguish contacts that did match vs. those that did not?)

By design? What are you guys smoking?!!.

Please consider:

We're talking about the 'All A B C ...' filter tool bar in the contacts view.

- Clicking the All button shows all contacts, as would be expected.
- Clicking the A button shows all contacts ???
- Clicking the B button shows all contacts EXCEPT those beginning with A.
- Clicking the C button shows all contacts EXCEPT those beginning with A or B.

Imagine having 10,000 contacts... What is this feature possibly good for,
seeing only those beginning with Z ??

My expectation is:
- clicking the A button would show ONLY contacts beginning with A
- clicking the B button would show ONLY contacts beginning with B
- clicking the C button would show ONLY contacts beginning with C
and so on.

I think it's a valid bug. My vote is for making it work as I have described
and beefing up the search feature to permit full use of * and ? in the search
string. The present, trailing * is a good start, but could go a little further.

I have voted in bugzilla http://bugzilla.zimbra.com/show_bug.cgi?id=10370 .

Regards,

-Glen

[KevinH]

Glen, we've targeted your suggestions for the next major release.

[Splat]

I agree, Vote placed.



My expectation is:
- clicking the A button would show ONLY contacts beginning with A
- clicking the B button would show ONLY contacts beginning with B
- clicking the C button would show ONLY contacts beginning with C
and so on.

[gihrig]

Originally Posted by KevinH

Glen, we've targeted your suggestions for the next major release.

Thanks Kevin, your response is encouraging, and appreciated.

Originally Posted by schemers

We actually do partial searches now, you just have to use a trailing "*". For example: "Jo*" should work.

This is good, a powerful and unexpectedly rich feature (the whole search and query ability).

It would be great to have a context help button that opens directly to the appropriate help page.


Regards,

-Glen