Bug 353998

Summary:	When searching for an application via keyboard in kickoff, show on each search result the location where to find it
Product:	[Plasma] plasmashell	Reporter:	Gerold Jens Wucherpfennig <gjwucherpfennig>
Component:	Application Launcher (Kickoff)	Assignee:	David Edmundson <kde>
Status:	CONFIRMED ---
Severity:	wishlist	CC:	nate, notuxius, plasma-bugs, skierpage, thomas.pfeiffer
Priority:	NOR	Keywords:	usability
Version:	5.4.2	Flags:	kde: Usability+
Target Milestone:	1.0
Platform:	Arch Linux
OS:	Linux
Latest Commit:		Version Fixed In:
Sentry Crash Report:
Attachments:	search-categories

Description Gerold Jens Wucherpfennig 2015-10-17 12:23:31 UTC

Wish: When searching for an application via keyboard in kickoff,
show on each search result the location (i.e. the application menu sub-category)
where the application can be found.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
One example:
1. click at the K-Menu
2. type "konsole" via the keyboard
3. the application item Konsole is shown
4. next time you run Konsole you may want to know where to find Konsole in the app menu!
5. you have to click into each application category and go back each time, to find eventually find out, that it is in "System"

Actual Results:
You can run Konsole this way, but you do not know where to find it in the application menu.
You have to click at each category in the application menu until you eventually
find Konsole in the category "System".

Expected Results:
When you have typed "konsole" and selected the search result "Konsole"
(or on mouse hover over "Konsole"), there should be displayed " found in category 'System' "
at the right, next to "Konsole". Then after typing something in kickoff you would then
instantly know where (in which application category) to find each search result.

Well, you might think, that everybody should know that "Konsole" can be found
in "System" (in the application menu), but there are other applications.
You do not always know for each application, in which of the 10 categories
each can be found. Making my wish to be come true would increase the
overall usability of the kickoff application menu for many people!

Comment 1 David Edmundson 2015-10-19 23:07:25 UTC

thanks for the suggestion.

my gut reaction is that this isn't worth it  (both the extra code, and the visual space)

for people who primarily use searching, knowing how to browse for it isn't something you take in - and for people browsing you're not going to see it anyway.

systemsettings has a feature a bit like this where instead of showing config modules that match it highlights them so you can find it next time - and personally I don't think it has helped me remember anything.

However I've tagged the usability team for some discussion.

Comment 2 Thomas Pfeiffer 2015-10-20 20:21:33 UTC

I do agree with the problem: I don't think users can be clearly separated into "browsers" and "searchers" in this case. Users may go the category they expect an application to be in, and if they don't see it there but don't want to go through all categories until they find it, they may use the search features instead. Since they may still prefer browsing generally, it would be helpful to them if they knew where to find the application next time.

I also agree that showing the category for each search result may be too much for those users who do indeed use mostly search and don't care a lot about categories.

How about putting the category in a tooltip instead of showing it permanently? That way it wouldn't bother users who prefer search in general, while still allowing those who normally prefer search to look where they may find an application by browsing the next time.

Comment 3 skierpage 2016-06-11 22:23:09 UTC

This bothers me too.

(In reply to Thomas Pfeiffer from comment #2)
> How about putting the category in a tooltip instead of showing it
> permanently?

That could work. I would expect to find an application's category by right-clicking and choosing Properties from the application's context menu.  Application Launcher/Kickoff has an Edit Application... context menu item, which is close enough to Properties.  But the "Properties for <application> dialog" that this brings up doesn't indicate the application's category, and also when you search for an application in Kickoff, for some reason its context menu in search results is different and lacks the Edit Application... menu item.

Comment 4 Alexander Mentyu 2017-08-27 15:27:20 UTC

Could be something similar to KRunner categories (attached 'search-categories' screenshot).

Comment 5 Alexander Mentyu 2017-08-27 15:27:51 UTC

Created attachment 107543 [details]
search-categories