Usecases of Plugin Manager (NetBeans 6.0)

(partially based on the original UI spec as designed before the post-M9 redesigns)

• User wants to quickly find updates for his installation and update all modules
  • there is a separate Updates tab with all the updates listed
  • all updates have their checkboxes checked for updating by default
  • the Updates tab is the default tab whenever the Plugin Manager is opened

• User wants to check Plugin Manager for available support for certain technology/area of interest
  • big components (like Ruby, C/C++) are displayed in the New Plugins list in bold font
  • first look into the New Plugins tab shows only the big components, the rest of smaller features (hundreds of small modules) are hidden under the "357 more..." button at the end of the list of big components

• User wants to find interesting new features that will make his life easier when working on some specific task (e.g. authoring html documentation, manipulating images, ...whatever)
  • user goes to New Plugins tab of the Plugin Manager and writes a keyword to the Search field on the top of the panel; the keyword is found in names and descriptions of all modules and the list is filtered out to show only the appropriate items

• User wants to find interesting new features (small utilities) that will make his life easier in some way, but he does not know exactly what he is looking for
  • user goes to New Plugins tab of the Plugin Manager, clicks on "357 more..." and skims through the list, clicking on some of the items and reading their description
  • the list of the "small utilities" may be very long (we hope), so the layout of the Plugin Manager is designed in a way to show as many items at once as possible

• User is an enthusiast who is interested in any new NetBeans feature made available recently on Update Centers
  • user goes to New Plugins tab of the Plugin Manager, clicks on the Release Date column of the table to have the items sorted by their publish date and sees the newest plugins on the top of the list
  • whenever the user later returns to the Plugin Manager, the New Plugins tab's list of features stays sorted by the Release Date and the user immediately sees which plugins are new

• User has downloaded an NBM file of a NetBeans plugin from some website and wants to install the plugin in his IDE
  • user goes to Downloaded tab and uses Add Plugins... button to browse for the NBM on his disk
  • user then clicks Install

• User is an advanced user and knows that he wants to install only a certain functionality which is part of a bigger component (e.g. XSLT support which is part of SOA)
  • user goes to Settings tab and changes the view to "View: NetBeans Modules (NBM)"
  • user then goes to New Plugins tab, searches for XSLT and installs only the XSLT related modules
  • user then switches the view back to "View: Plugins"

• User wants to see which technology supports are installed in his IDE
  • user goes to Installed tab and looks at the list of bold items, clicking on them and reading the descriptions

• User wants to temporarily deactivate a certain functionality or completely uninstall a certain functionality to make the UI of the IDE simpler and not so much bloated
  • user goes to Installed tab, finds in the list the functionality he is not using and either uses Deactivate or Uninstall action

• User is an administrator of network installations in a school or in a company and wants to administer the shared installation of the NetBeans IDE
  • user goes to the Settings tab and selects the option "Install into shared directories"
  • user then goes to Updates or New Plugins and updates/installs whatever he wants to be shared

• User has learned a URL of someone's personal Update Center and wants to have access to the plugins available there
  • user goes to the Settings tab and adds the Update Center into the list of Update Centers

• User is a developer of NetBeans modules and wants to see the state of his modules installed in the IDE, look at the state of eager modules or autoloads
  • user goas to Settings tab and changes the view to "View: NetBeans Modules (NBM)"
  • user then goes to Installed tab and skims through the list