[Lotus Notes Sucks: Example 8]
Unnecessary Clicking
Problem
When I drag-and-drop a Microsoft Excel worksheet into a new mail message, the entire worksheet is shown, instead of an icon representing a worksheet. To make the attachment appear as an icon, I have to right-click it, then choose Display As... from the shortcut menu. The result is a dialog box:
Analysis
This is really two problems. Drag-and-drop doesn't work properly. When a user drags and then drops a file onto an email message, it is the same action as attaching the file. This means an icon representing the file should appear in the mail message. Cleverly, though, even if you get the file to appear as an icon, the recipient can't detach it.
The second problem is the shortcut menu. There are five items in the list, but you can only see four at a time. What moron designed this? It's not as though there isn't enough room to show all five items. And why would I want to display a worksheet as a bitmap?
Update
I notice that Lotus Notes finally works the way it should with regard to the drag-and-dropping of attachments. It also appears that I am now running Lotus Notes 5.0.11. Of course, this is still totally lame—this problem should have been fixed years ago.
User Interface Guideline Violations
- Forcing the user to click unnecessarily.
- Interface does not do as the user expects.
- The list of items might increase. How about alphabetizing it?
- Since no item in the list is selected, the OK button should appear unavailable.
- Forcing the user to deal with stupidity.
Conclusion
Lotus Notes sucks.