Many user interface issues and ideas

I just got this email from Marc, a long-time beta tester of my products. He covers a lot of ground, so look this over and let me know how you feel about any piece of it.

Could you query for the from name in setup? That is the one thing I had to
change in the preferences after doing setup. (It seems like maybe it didn't
"stick" but I have not proved that yet.)

Only .Mac users skip the email setup, to make it as simple as possible. How about a check box or an extra button (next to back/continue to optionally show email choices in that case?

Need a way to re-run the initial setup. Maybe everything is in the
preferences but sometimes you just want to see that original thing again.

I was afraid somebody would ask for that. Adding a new server in Preferences has its own sort of assistant, through sheets. Perhaps I should make it more like Mail - including the add a server in Prefs be more like the assistant. Or allow rerunning Enclose Setup. Could be done.

Maybe the button at the bottom of the Servers Preferences pane should read
Update Server Status instead of Check Server Status since the server status
is being displayed currently on the pane. I thought I might get to see
something different with the button but apparently not.

This validates all server settings as well as operation by uploading and downloading a test file. You should have seen a sheet saying the server is okay. (Actually this is getting triggered at some wrong times. It also checks when server settings are changed, but sometimes when no change was made.

The "Always Zip files" (check capitalization, I'd prefer lower case "zip" OR
upper case "files") doesn't seem to fit with the other stuff on the files
pane. Everything else is about removing files.

I haven't figured out if zip is a proper noun. Probably not - lower case it is.

My iDisk statistics are showing using 0.000mb. The .mac System Preferences
shows I am using 131mb. Or is this just the enclose folder?

Just Enclose. Potentially confusing perhaps.

The recipients pane at the left of the email window does not seem to be
working.

I did this:
send a message
turn on always zip
try to send message again
The second send was not zipped.

In my mind, zipping applies to files, and here, you are just sending another message about a file that was already zipped (or not). I could add a warning if you have this pref on and start a message about a non-zipped file (too annoying? User pref?)

The email pane needs some more work on its layout. It does not yet have
that indefinable "professional" quality. Maybe the to/from/subject lines
are too close together. Maybe it is that "line" with the gear on one end
and Send on the other with all that blank space in between. Maybe it's the
placement of the red X. Dunno for sure.

Good point. I'll see what I can do. The red X is somewhat innovative (not necessarily in a good way) but looks ok to me. But overall it does look unpolished.

I'm not quite clear on that big Drag Files Here area that apparently has no
other function except as a drop zone. Could I just drop the files into a
list somewhere?

"Drag Files Here" is one of the more annoying design issues. Alan has already suggested that it should go all the way across the top, at least before I put up the big file icon, which I think I agree with. Actually the whole window is a drop zone, with exceptions for most window elements. This is hinted at by mouseover hilighting of the window.

I suppose you could drag into the files list (and that could be a way to temporarily skip the auto-message creation if you're going to drag the URL instead). But it's not visible usually.

I'm not quite clear on the edit pane in its empty form versus when it has a
message in it versus when a message opens in a window of its own.

I could add some documentation on its behavior. A message is created either because a file was dragged (with auto-create pref on), or because you resent a file or message, or because you resend the current file (large icon). If no message is currently being edited in the main window, it is edited there in the message pane. If a message is already being edited there, it starts a new window.

There was a suggestion that multiple messages go into browser-like tabs instead of separate windows. Not sure how much of a priority this is at present.

I tried to send a little text file of these comments. The file name was
"Enclose comments." It insisted on zipping it regardless of the Preferences
setting. Is that expected behavior?

Well, it's expected by me :-). It's probably because there was no file extension (or was it a package document like .rtfd?). There has to be an extension for the http download. I've thought about having an auto-extension adding feature, but am not sure how hard or effective this would be. (also needs to be documented)

Messing around with that I had several copies of the file in the file list.
I tried deleting some of them from the server. Even though I did not touch
the one that showed sent, it was not on the server when I tried to retrieve
it via the email link.

Bug? I'll try to reproduce that.

Is there no way to delete items completely from the file list?

Edit > Delete. Probably need a keyboard shortcut. I will also have a toolbar button for that soon, but hesitate to put it in by default (due to clutter).

Once I clicked the "never" button on a file there was no way to get it back
to automatic deletion.

Should work at least via File > Set Remove Date... I'll check. Might add a "Set Date" button alongside it. (This is in the detail view when you select a file)

I wonder if the Edit/Draft/Sent/Files buttons should be set up more as
regular tabs instead of buttons in the toolbar.

Could be an improvement if done right - it raises several interface issues. I'm not wild about the standard tabs-that-aren't-tabs, either.