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Build Identifier: RCP-TRUNK-114 In the Eclipse marketplace dialog (Help -> Eclipse Marketplace...) plug-ins can only be installed one by one, as the click on the Install Button starts directly the install process. Only when you select an plug-in whose prerequisite has not been installed (e.g. Birt Runtime as it requires Reporting Information Unit) the install process is stopped and by using the back button in the dialog the Button Install is now labeled Install pending. Now pressing on Install buttons of other non installed plugins put them also in state Install Pending. The going further with Next all selected plugins can be installed (if all dependencies can be resolved). This should be the desired way. Reproducible: Always
Tom, could you either move that bug or create a separate bug for MPC if it should get looked at by the MPC team? Thanks.
Ok, moving
This behaviour is intentional, designed to support a simple, single-click install. To make this possible the wizard automatically advances to the confirmation page once the first item is selected. Using the back button in the wizard was a compromise to enable selection of multiple items for more advanced users. Ian what do you think about this?
I have the same feeling. It should be dead-easy for people to install a specific solution. They still have the possibility with the back button to return to the solutions listing and add additional plugins.
Well if that is really the behaviour wanted (which I frankly disagree) the back button should be relabelled to something more obvious (like "select more") because I've seen too often people hate the solutions install of eclipse even with the marketPlace as they say they cant select many solutions then click install and go away while the installation is done. On the other side, I usually install many solutions at once, I don't care one more click one a 'next' button when I'm done selecting what I want, but I hate having to remember some work around to do the multiselection.
I discussed this with Ian a bit more. I think it's a good idea to have the single-install scenario as convenient as possible, because (aside from the occasional Eclipse reinstall or a large shift in your technology stack) this is the most common case. It should however be a lot more obvious that you can actually install multiple solutions at once (personally, I never thought about using the 'back' button). It should also be as convenient as possible while keeping the behavior of the first click on 'Install'. Our current suggestion is to relabel the wizard buttons ('Select more' and 'Install now') as suggested by Jonatan for better user guidance. I'd also change the subtext in the confirmation page banner to point to that possibility and make the initial choice sound less "final". Minor detail, but since we're doing a new mockup of the Marketplaces area in bug 341014, I would try and see if we can work the "x solutions selected" label into a nicer overall look of that area. Later, it might be worth looking into doing the P2 planning without blocking the 'Back' function or requiring a manual abort, so the user can immediately go back. Having to go back the first time wouldn't be half as annoying if it wasn't blocked by the automatically triggered planning process. I suspect that change to turn out a bit tricky though, so I'd like to split that off into a separate ticket and focus on other issues first.
Although I can understand the argument of a dead-easy one click install, in my opinion the current behavior is not very intuitive. For me it even was a bit surprising that one is able to go back to select further packages to install AFTER I already told Eclipse to install a package. Even it you would need one click more in the "install only one package" use case, I also would change the marketplace behavior to simply select all packages I want to install (pressing the 'Install' button) and then proceed with a single click on the relabled 'Install now' button as Carsten suggested. After selecting a package to install, the buttons text of the corresponding package should change to the current 'Install Pending'.
I like how it's done in iTunes or Android Playstore: Select solutions one by one, they are installed in background but while the install is proceeding I can continue browsing and schedule the next item for installation. Essentially, solve the problem outlined by bug 327667 .
(In reply to comment #8) > I like how it's done in iTunes or Android Playstore: > > Select solutions one by one, they are installed in background but while the > install is proceeding I can continue browsing and schedule the next item for > installation. > > Essentially, solve the problem outlined by bug 327667 . I don't know p2 well enough but it seems like the workflow won't support it. For example, how do you accept the license terms if the install is a background task?
(In reply to comment #9) > I don't know p2 well enough but it seems like the workflow won't support it. > For example, how do you accept the license terms if the install is a background > task? We couldn't do it in the background. It would require popping up the wizard again after one install is completed, showing the confirmation page and letting the user finish the previously scheduled installs of additional solutions. Since P2 is pretty much in lockdown during a running install, we wouldn't even be able to check if the installation would be viable beforehand AFAIK. All that would have to be postponed until after the currently running install. I don't think that would really add much to the overall user experience.
I guess you're right, I forgot that in terms of the dependency resolution Eclipse/p2 is a lot more complex than IOS / Android where each app is more or less an independent item on top of the Platform without any dependencies on other apps. Anyways, supporting some other way of multi-plugin-install would be a big plus.
For now, I've pushed commit e240c93eb20df51601387950184bae1150cb8dbd, which changes the Back and Next button labels on the wizard to make it clearer that you can go back to select more. I've also updated the description text on the second page to make that clearer. I'd like to also change the presentation of selected solutions on the first wizard page to reinforce the impression that you can add more than one item: Instead of the text link that is currently shown only when something is selected, I'd add a more shopping-cart-like notification button that is always visible. The screenshots on bug 323259 show what it could look like. What do you think?
(In reply to comment #12) > For now, I've pushed commit e240c93eb20df51601387950184bae1150cb8dbd, which > changes the Back and Next button labels on the wizard to make it clearer > that you can go back to select more. I've also updated the description text > on the second page to make that clearer. > > I'd like to also change the presentation of selected solutions on the first > wizard page to reinforce the impression that you can add more than one item: > Instead of the text link that is currently shown only when something is > selected, I'd add a more shopping-cart-like notification button that is > always visible. The screenshots on bug 323259 show what it could look like. > > What do you think? I am not seeing the shopping cart idea in the screenshots. Can you link directly to what you are referencing?
I wonder if we should change the behaviour so that even the first time you select a listing to install it changes to 'Install Pending' and then the user would need to select Install Now. It feels non-intuitive to select Install and then have to go back to Install More. Thoughts?
(In reply to comment #13) > I am not seeing the shopping cart idea in the screenshots. Can you link > directly to what you are referencing? Oh sorry, I forgot that it only was in some images. I was referring to the blue button at the top in this screenshot: https://bugs.eclipse.org/bugs/attachment.cgi?id=228083
(In reply to comment #14) > I wonder if we should change the behaviour so that even the first time you > select a listing to install it changes to 'Install Pending' and then the user > would need to select Install Now. That's easily changed. We just have to decide which of the two gives the better user experience. > It feels non-intuitive to select Install and then have to go back to Install > More. It's the normal flow of most webshops and app stores. You select an item and get directed to the checkout process, from where you can go back to pick more. To me, it feels more natural to be sent on when clicking Install as far as the flow is concerned. It just might be inconvenient when routinely installing more than one item. My main issue so far was that the option of going back was not made very clear. I think it comes down to how people use the MPC. If the most frequent use case is finding and installing a single new plug-in, the current behavior is probably nicer. If people regularly (would like to) install many plug-ins at once, we should focus on that. Maybe the Marketplace install statistics data could shed some light on that?
(In reply to comment #16) > > I think it comes down to how people use the MPC. If the most frequent use > case is finding and installing a single new plug-in, the current behavior is > probably nicer. If people regularly (would like to) install many plug-ins at > once, we should focus on that. Maybe the Marketplace install statistics data > could shed some light on that? Unfortunately we don't keep stats on how people install one item vs multiple item. Let me explore some other app stores to see what others do. For now lets leave it as you have it.
Ian, did you have a chance to compare other app stores yet? We still have a few days left to change the behavior for M7.
(In reply to comment #18) > Ian, did you have a chance to compare other app stores yet? We still have a > few days left to change the behavior for M7. I agree the current workflow is correct so no change is required.
Resolving as fixed, then. Also note that as a nice side effect, the remediation workflow from bug 406907 makes the switch from marketplace to feature selection page much faster, streamlining the multiselect use case further.
Cleanup: closing all released fixes.
