I have watched my users use the DateTime Picker and have noticed that they are slightly confused by its default UI behavior. I'd like to make a case for a small tweak, for better intuitiveness.
Recommendation: the selected date should be forgotten, not remembered, when the user clicks on the header and chooses a different month from the list of months.
We are using the DateTime Picker to pick a day, which triggers some other action. Nothing special. The day cell style shows that is has been chosen. However, when the user clicks on the header and chooses a different month, any previously chosen day number is remembered. If the previous selection was May 3rd, when the user changes to December, the 3rd will be selected. The cell style shows it. This pre-selection causes users to pause every time. They wait for the desired selected-date behavior to occur because they see the visible sign that a selection has occurred. Then they realize it is a default and click on a date.
Not a big problem, just a small hitch in the step.
Thanks
Recommendation: the selected date should be forgotten, not remembered, when the user clicks on the header and chooses a different month from the list of months.
We are using the DateTime Picker to pick a day, which triggers some other action. Nothing special. The day cell style shows that is has been chosen. However, when the user clicks on the header and chooses a different month, any previously chosen day number is remembered. If the previous selection was May 3rd, when the user changes to December, the 3rd will be selected. The cell style shows it. This pre-selection causes users to pause every time. They wait for the desired selected-date behavior to occur because they see the visible sign that a selection has occurred. Then they realize it is a default and click on a date.
Not a big problem, just a small hitch in the step.
Thanks
3 Answers, 1 is accepted
0
Hello Tim,
Georgi Krustev
the Telerik team
Calendar widget persists the number of the focused date. If the13th of January is focused (has a gray backround) and the end user navigates to February then the 13th day will be focused, because this is the expected bahavior for most of the users. Please note that the selected date actually has an orange background.
Nevertheless I will log your request for further consideration. If other users require same change in the behavior we will schedule it for further investigation.
Georgi Krustev
the Telerik team
Join us on our journey to create the world's most complete HTML 5 UI Framework - download Kendo UI now!
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Tim R
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answered on 27 Feb 2013, 11:46 AM
Thank you, Georgi, for the reply.
Correct behavior should be the guiding principle. The issue should not always be reduced to "if enough other users want X".
The Microsoft Windows 7 desktop popup calendar (whose UI behavior Kendo emulates in many key respects) does not carry over the selected day when the user navigates to a different month; rather, the default selection rectangle is placed on the 1st day of the month.
However, I do not wish to base the argument on "what Microsoft does" though I know that Microsoft is often the de facto standard for Telerik.
The main compelling reason why the selected day should be not carried over into a different month is this: the change event does not fire when the user navigates to a different month. The selected-day styling implies that a selection has been made. But no selection has been made. The UI does not accurately reflect the widget's behavior.
Regards
Tim
P.S. I am attaching two screen captures to show what I mean.
#1: 21 FEB is already selected (orange) when the user expands the popup. Then user clicks on 15 FEB. Gray rectangle shows 15th has been clicked.
#2: User has navigated to the month of March. 15 FEB is still the chosen day. The 15th day retains the gray rectangle in the March view; moments earlier this gray rectangle was the visible cue to the user that she had clicked on the 15th. But no date has been clicked on in the March view. The gray rectangle has ambiguous meaning. The user is trained like a rat to associate gray rectangle with "click on day". The rat is confused. Rat bites programmer.
Correct behavior should be the guiding principle. The issue should not always be reduced to "if enough other users want X".
The Microsoft Windows 7 desktop popup calendar (whose UI behavior Kendo emulates in many key respects) does not carry over the selected day when the user navigates to a different month; rather, the default selection rectangle is placed on the 1st day of the month.
However, I do not wish to base the argument on "what Microsoft does" though I know that Microsoft is often the de facto standard for Telerik.
The main compelling reason why the selected day should be not carried over into a different month is this: the change event does not fire when the user navigates to a different month. The selected-day styling implies that a selection has been made. But no selection has been made. The UI does not accurately reflect the widget's behavior.
Regards
Tim
P.S. I am attaching two screen captures to show what I mean.
#1: 21 FEB is already selected (orange) when the user expands the popup. Then user clicks on 15 FEB. Gray rectangle shows 15th has been clicked.
#2: User has navigated to the month of March. 15 FEB is still the chosen day. The 15th day retains the gray rectangle in the March view; moments earlier this gray rectangle was the visible cue to the user that she had clicked on the 15th. But no date has been clicked on in the March view. The gray rectangle has ambiguous meaning. The user is trained like a rat to associate gray rectangle with "click on day". The rat is confused. Rat bites programmer.
0
Hello Tim,
Georgi Krustev
the Telerik team
As I pointed your request has been logged in our backlog for further investigation.
Also we are going to improve focused state of the Kendo widgets for the upcoming release.
Georgi Krustev
the Telerik team
Join us on our journey to create the world's most complete HTML 5 UI Framework - download Kendo UI now!