Connectivity:Usability:High Level Design Comments

DTP Connectivity Usability High Level Design Comments

<BrianF>Comments should go on this and we will integrate them in with the design document. Please remember to note your comments in brackets, such as <BrianF>My comments...</BrianF> so we can keep track of different threads. Any comments that are sent in to the newsgroup or mailing lists may be paraphrased and reposted on the Comments page and be integrated into the document also.

We look forward to your feedback and suggestions! </BrianF>

<LarryD>I think the new dialogs are a great improvement. However, I do think that usability could be dramatically improved by removing the concept of a driver instance so that the Driver Definitions Dialog and Preference Page could be removed altogether. Currently, the driver template acts as a template providing default values to the driver definitions dialog. The resulting driver instance created by the driver definitions dialog is then used as a template for setting the default values of a connection profile. It seems to me that the driver definition template could provide the default values directly to a connection profile eliminating the need for driver instances and the necessary dialogs and preference pages for managing them.

One of the functions provided by the driver instances is to give the user a way to simplify creating multiple connections with similar properties that may be different than those provided by the driver definition template. However, the user can accomplish the same task now by using the Duplicate menu item provided in the Data Source Explorer and editing the duplicated connection profile.

Another function provided by the driver instances is that they allow the user to edit the jar list for multiple connections in a single place. However, one way to address this is to provide a preference page for "Jarlist Aliases". The user could provide an alias name and the jar list in the preference page. Then when a new connection profile is created, the user could specify actual file paths or specify the alias. At connect time, the connectivity framework could convert the alias to the actual jar list specified in the preference page.

I do not believe the functionality provided by driver instances justifies the negative impact it makes on usability especially when the functionality can be provided in another more usable fashion. </LarryD>

<HuguesM> The new dialogs are a great improvement.

The request for improvement https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/show_bug.cgi?id=213584? is somewhat related to usability. It would let eclipse developers contribute connection profiles programmatically.

Supporting this scenario will make sure that users don't come up with unreasonable requirements for the UI of DTP that would only fit their own product.

For example, a set of plugins for a J2EE server might very well be aware of the definition of a JNDI datasource setup inside a J2EE server. It would know here is the driver and all parameters to connect to the database. This improvement would let those plugins add an appropriate connection profile. </HuguesM>