PB's User feedback

Author: Xingda Computer technology company (www.study01job.com) Guo Baoli

It is important to provide feedback in a timely manner to the user's actions in the system, which may be just like a warning bell or a display of the mouse to an hourglass, but it can give the user confidence and make him feel that the software is still in control without crashing.

The occasion of using feedback

In the client/server environment, users can not tolerate the system is slow, but in the actual application will often encounter the computer needs a long time to perform one or a batch of operations. In this case, feedback should be added to let the user know what the application is doing. Like what:

L The mouse should be displayed as an hourglass in the case of a shorter wait time (0-10 seconds), for this callable function Setpointer (hourglass!) To achieve this function;

L The micro-help to show the processing progress when the processing time takes 10-18 seconds;

l When processing time needs more than 18 seconds, to display this processing window or show progress bar;

L A warning sound such as beep (1) should be issued when a lengthy processing is completed, so that the user does not have to look at the screen all the time.

Ii. Several technical means of providing feedback

1. Micro-Help

Micro-Help is the text in the status bar below the MDI (multiple-document interface) box. The micro-help at the bottom of the window generally has two functions: first, when the user selects a menu item or other window control, display more text information to explain or prompt the user what to do; another purpose is for the system to display the working status in progress during the process so that the user can understand the process of the system. thereby eliminating the fear of the crash.

2. Help for the tool bar

When the mouse hovers over a toolbar, a pop-up message box appears, and the toolbar text is displayed by default in versions above PowerBuilder 4.0. You can also use a menu brush to add a comma after the toolbar text and a longer text to define a different tool bar description. For example, type exit, close application, and you will see the text displayed on the toolbar icon "Exit", and the pop-up message box displays "Close application."

3. Sound Tips

It is necessary to make a sound warning in a timely manner when a user is likely to perform a destructive operation, but not to abuse it, because when a user is unable to properly manipulate the software or do something they do not want to do, it is more annoying to hear the warning, so use this feedback method with caution. In addition, it is also necessary to use sound feedback (such as a warning sound or a small piece of sound) at the end of a long process.