Support and General Use > Theming and Appearance Customization
Themes Broken with 3.7: Syntax change?
[Saint]:
--- Quote from: Bockrox on January 04, 2011, 12:41:33 AM ---It was well documented for developers, but not for users. As a user, my themes broke and I had no idea why. There was no notification of the changes and no explanation for the strange behavior.
--- End quote ---
That is entirely untrue, if you followed the forums you would have known it was coming, received warning it was going to happen, and known when it did happen.
There was no lack of discussion around it.
[St.]
Llorean:
Basically, Rockbox can't know if it's simple a bad WPS or if it's an "old" WPS unless it contains the entire old WPS definition too, which would more or less defeat the point of removing it. So there's no way for Rockbox to tell you "this is an outdated WPS." It could pop up something when it fails to load a theme, but the fact that it fails to load the theme is evident anyway, isn't it? Getting the fallback theme is a pretty clear indication it failed.
But http://www.rockbox.org/wiki/MajorChanges which is the best place to get an overview of changes between releases mentions the skin breaking change, and links to a page that details it. You even mention that you read the release notes, so it's hardly fair to say "there was no notification" when it's right there, including explanation. "I didn't see the notification" or "I didn't know the right term to recognize the notification was relevant" is hardly the same as there not being one. I don't think it's fair to expect all users to follow the forums, but if you don't actually read through the release notes before upgrading (and click links) what happens to you can hardly be considered anyone else's fault.
Bockrox:
--- Quote from: [St.] on January 04, 2011, 01:12:17 AM ---That is entirely untrue, if you followed the forums you would have known it was coming, received warning it was going to happen, and known when it did happen.
There was no lack of discussion around it.
[St.]
--- End quote ---
I don't mean to step on any toes here, but I still say it's bad design. Don Norman calls it "visibility" -- few users are going to notice a new post in the forums before doing an upgrade, but most users would notice a notification from the Rockbox firmware or Rockbox Utility.
Post Merge: January 06, 2011, 12:00:16 AM
--- Quote from: Llorean on January 04, 2011, 01:19:59 AM ---Basically, Rockbox can't know if it's simple a bad WPS or if it's an "old" WPS unless it contains the entire old WPS definition too, which would more or less defeat the point of removing it. So there's no way for Rockbox to tell you "this is an outdated WPS."
--- End quote ---
Rockbox doesn't have the ability to know this now, but it could. To do this, you could require that the theme identifies what version of the theme language it is compatible with. A simple line in one of the files -- "theme_version=3" or something like that.
--- Quote from: Llorean on January 04, 2011, 01:19:59 AM ---It could pop up something when it fails to load a theme, but the fact that it fails to load the theme is evident anyway, isn't it?
--- End quote ---
Evident yes, but certainly not attractive. (In fact, it isn't especially evident either. When I saw my broken themes, I had no idea what was going on. Did I install something incorrectly? Is my iPod defective? Is this a bug in the firmware? Rockbox provides no real feedback of what's going other than "Something is wrong.")
--- Quote from: Llorean on January 04, 2011, 01:19:59 AM ---But http://www.rockbox.org/wiki/MajorChanges which is the best place to get an overview of changes between releases mentions the skin breaking change, and links to a page that details it. You even mention that you read the release notes, so it's hardly fair to say "there was no notification" when it's right there, including explanation. "I didn't see the notification" or "I didn't know the right term to recognize the notification was relevant" is hardly the same as there not being one.
--- End quote ---
Yes, I agree. I should have read more carefully.
--- Quote from: Llorean on January 04, 2011, 01:19:59 AM ---I don't think it's fair to expect all users to follow the forums, but if you don't actually read through the release notes before upgrading (and click links) what happens to you can hardly be considered anyone else's fault.
--- End quote ---
I disagree with this. When is the last time you read the Firefox release notes? Probably never. Has this lack of research ever resulted in your confusion? Probably not. Even without reading release notes, Firefox users are never confused about what is going on -- they aren't surprised when an extension stops working, for example.
I think this is because Firefox has a fairly elegant update notifier -- "We notice you upgraded to Firefox 4, but Adblock is not compatible with Firefox 4. It is being disabled now."
[Saint]:
--- Quote from: Bockrox on January 05, 2011, 09:42:01 PM ---When is the last time you read the Firefox release notes? Probably never.
--- End quote ---
Ignorance to the documentation, whether deliberate or not, is not the fault of the product.
It certainly cannot be the fault of the software if you blindly installed it without thinking that there may be consequences attached to doing so.
I flatly refuse to believe that anyone can say that there was a lack of notification, or is a lack of documentation about the theme breaking changes introduced.
[St.]
Bockrox:
--- Quote from: [St.] on January 06, 2011, 03:38:46 AM ---Ignorance to the documentation, whether deliberate or not, is not the fault of the product.
--- End quote ---
I still disagree. Just having something on paper doesn't allow us to wash our hands of the issue. The information needs to be presented to the user when he needs it and where he needs it. I am willfully ignorant of the Firefox documentation, but this has never caused me grief in all my years of using it.
--- Quote from: [St.] on January 06, 2011, 03:38:46 AM ---It certainly cannot be the fault of the software if you blindly installed it without thinking that there may be consequences attached to doing so.
--- End quote ---
Again, I frequently upgrade Firefox blindly, but I have never been seen an extension break completely without warning.
--- Quote from: [St.] on January 06, 2011, 03:38:46 AM ---I flatly refuse to believe that anyone can say that there was a lack of notification, or is a lack of documentation about the theme breaking changes introduced.
--- End quote ---
There was not a lack of documentation, but I believe there certainly was a lack of notification -- neither the Rockbox Utility nor the Rockbox firmware told me anything about these breaking changes. These are the two core pieces of software I was interacting with during the upgrade, so I believe the information should have been presented there.
I still argue that a better approach would be the one Firefox takes. The Rockbox firmware could notify me when a theme is out of date, disable it, and then instruct me to upgrade it.
It looks like we're just going to have to agree to disagree. I would, however, recommend that the Rockbox team pull in more developers interested in usability, as I think this conversation could benefit from more of those perspectives.
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