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Old 02-15-2006, 05:45 PM
srdiamond srdiamond is online now
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Join Date: 11-23-2004
Location: Los Angeles
Posts: 126
I still tend to think this discussion has taken place at so abstract a level that it's hard to know whether we're talking about the same problem. And there's also the question of whether existing features might not have already solved some of the problems. This has certainly been true for me. Every week or so I discover a new feature and wonder how I missed it. Or more frequently, something takes way too long, but I just fail to think of the easy solution at the time. These possibilies don't completely answer the critique, because it may be the case that some aspect of design could be improved so the right move is more compelling at the moment. But it suggests a different kind of problem than the one being discussed.

So allow me to follow my own advice and state clearly where I find using UR with a complex database somehow seems like its harder than it ought to be.

Here's my standard scenario. I import various things into UR over a few days. Then I see my imported folder is getting large, maybe 20 items. So I decide to organize them, so it doesn't get so large that I am tempted to simply trash all of them.

The problem is how to get the items into the right folders. How do I efficiently get each of these imports into the proper folder? I can think of the obvious shortcuts--finding all of them that belong somewhere, copying all, and then pasting into the destination, for example. But in practice I end up just taking each, surveying my hierarchy, and then dragging to or pasting into the location.

Why is this a "clutter" issue. Well, obviously the tree's expanse, absent hoist, makes these efforts a little harder. But even though impressionistically it feels like a clutter issue, that's probably not what it is in the main. The main bottleneck isn't navigation. Rather, it is in the number of separate operations required.

What would solve this? Ideally, I think of this feature. The hierarchy is automatically numbered, maybe legal outline numbering would work best here: 1.2.1.5--that sort of numbering, so the first digit designates a folder at root level, the second at second level... I see my list of items to file and in a separate pane the folders in which it can be filed. When I find the one I want, I simply type the folder's number beside the item. When I'm done, I press a button, and they all go where they belong. The indexing may make my computer unavailable for a few minutes, but at least it is all happening in one block and not interrupting anything.
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