[Dekko] Missing empty state on wide mode startup

[David Planella]

When I start Dekko in wide mode (e.g. on a desktop), I'm presented with the list of messages on the left and the individual message view on the right.

Initially, until I've clicked on a message on the list, the individual message pane on the right stays blank. It would be good to have a defined empty state in order not to have a blank view. I guess this needs design input, but off the top of my head a static page (similar to Thunderbird) or pre-selecting the last message on the list could be options to consider.

[Dan Chapman  (dpniel)]

Thanks for the report.

Yes this probably does need some design input, as none of the current designs have anything regarding this.

I think some sort of empty state would be a good thing to show here. It could possibly be better to do it as a static web page rather than in qml. As at the moment Dekko just loads "about:blank" to ensure it's empty, which could easily be changed for a different page.

The one thing we can't do is preselect a message that is still unread, as that will trigger an action to mark it as read on the server without any user interaction. Instead we could select the last opened/selected message before the previous session was quit. So you would only end up seeing the empty state the first time you open a mailbox or if the server informed us the message uid's have changed and we have to trash our current cache. I think they are the only two instances the empty state view would be needed.

[Dan Chapman  (dpniel)]

Log from yesterdays discussion at weekly meeting.

 12:50 <JMulholland> re: 1548672 - Yes, we should have some sort of empty state for this. My personal preference would be to show the most recent message, with “No message selected” (or similar) for when nothing available to pre-select

 12:50 <JMulholland> what do you think?

 12:51 <davmor2> JMulholland: popey is at embedded world

 12:51 <JMulholland> thanks davmor2, got my wires crossed and thought he was having fun with the others at MWC :)

 12:53 <dpm> I'm sure he's having fun, yesterday he sent a picture with ogra in a suit!

 12:53 <JMulholland> haha! :D

 12:53 <dpm> that what snappy makes to you :)

 12:53 <DanChapman> JMulholland, yep sounds good. Just to be sure... So if a folder has been previously opened in either a previous or current session then select the last viewed message other wise just a simple message with "No message selected"?

 12:55 <JMulholland> Id say so, it’s that or show the most recently received message by default - they both have pro’s and cons.

 12:58 <JMulholland> What would you guys prefer in your day-to-day emailing? A) Show the most recently receieved message when you open the app. B) persist the state between sessions and show the last thing you looked at.

 12:58 <DanChapman> Yeah i'd avoid automatically selecting a recently received unread message. That will change state on the server without user interaction, which is usually frowned upon. OTOH I would think it's fine to do that if it's triggered from a push notification message being activated & launching Dekko.

 12:58 <JMulholland> very good point

 12:59 <JMulholland> so lets go with persisting between sessions, sound good to you too faenil?

 12:59 * faenil tunes back in, after being pulled into another conv

 13:00 <JMulholland> …which is why I do these meetings in a meeting room :P

 13:00 <faenil> JMulholland: that doesn't help :)

 13:00 <faenil> (chat conv)

 13:00 <JMulholland> heheh.

 13:00 <DanChapman> :-D

 13:01 <faenil> sounds good to me

 13:01 <faenil> (if we really have to show something)

 13:02 <faenil> personally I wouldn't open any email at startup, you could be with another person who should not be reading that email

 13:02 <JMulholland> that’s a valid poiny

 13:03 <JMulholland> *point

 13:03 <JMulholland> Perhaps not such an issue for a small device, but on a large monitor....

 13:04 <faenil> yeah

 13:04 <faenil> especially on a large monitor

 13:04 <faenil> but even because you might not want to wait for an email to load, before having to go back and open another one

 13:04 <faenil> mmm don't know

 13:04 <DanChapman> just tried geary, thunderbird & nylas and they all show the last selected message.

 13:05 <JMulholland> As does “outbox” and “mail”

 13:05 <faenil> time's up for me :) cya next time people o/

 13:05 <faenil> DanChapman: as usual, ping me as needed :)

 13:05 <DanChapman> Cya faenil. Will do :-)

 13:05 <JMulholland> and yea, the wait for the load combined with pickup/put down sessions (due to distractions or (hopefully not) crashes)… Picking up where you left off would be nice.

 13:06 <JMulholland> thanks faenil, see you!

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