Deleting a Notebook - User's Perspective
Metaphor
The notebook is built on the interface metaphor of a real notebook where
everyone can write on it or change the contents in it as long as he (or
she) has access to it. The metaphor for deleting a notebook is a
poor match, since there are few physical actions on a notebook that accurately
convey creation/deletion. If we view the New command, notebook creation,
as taking a blank notebook from a bin and affixing a label to it, then
the reverse would appear to be removing the label and replacing it in the
blank notebook bin. This is an awkward way to view files, since until
the notebook was created it didn't exist somewhere. A trashcan metaphor
may be more accurate for deletion. If we take a blank piece of paper
and scribble something on it, then decide that the paper is worthless we
discard the paper into a wastebasket removing it from our desktop.
This is not a clear matching command pair, new/trash, but it is consistent
with the Windows9x and Macintosh file handling pairs New/Recycle Bin and
New/Trashcan.
While it is a natural thought that if a user can create a new notebook
then he (or she) should be able to delete it, the collaborative nature
of the project makes this less clear. It is not clear that if a document
is on a conference table being discussed by multiple parties it can be
discarded by one member of the group. This is more power than a single
individual has in a meeting situation.
Active User
As discussed above that it is natural to believe that users should be able
to delete a notebook created by themselves. This follows from the belief
that all simple actions should be reversible. The corrective action,
in this case deleting a notebook, should also be as easy as pressing the
New Notebook button that created it. The fact that users can not
delete the notebook they created may discourage the active users since
their action now have an undesirable permanence. The lack of action
pairs can lead to user irritation in navigating the interface. More
importantly the irreversibility of some actions can greatly discourage
the exploratory learning style of an active user.