Assumptions

• Chandler Desktop users may not have Chandler open or "in-front" at all times. Instead, we expect users will spend most of their time at their computer, sitting in the Inbox of their chosen email client. As a result, it is as important for Desktop users to to receive Ecosystem-generated communications in their email client as it is for users to receive communications directly in Chandler.
• Chandler Desktop users are the only ones that can ultimately decide whether an email should be added to their Chandler Desktop PIM. As a result, users need a way to add emails from their email client into Chandler on an ad-hoc basis.

Ideal Workflow Patterns for common Alpha 4 Usage Scenarios

• Receiving an invitation from another Chandler user.
  • Receive invitation in your email client; and
  • Click on link in email to launch Chandler and view invitation in your Dashboard in Chandler; OR
  • Receive invitation in your Dashboard in Chandler

• • Add invitation to your calendar

• Receiving updates to a Chandler Item you sent out.
  • Receive update in your email client; and
  • Click on link in email to launch Chandler and view update in your Dashboard in Chandler; OR

• • Receive update in your Dashboard in Chandler

• Receiving an email that you would like to add to your Chandler Task list.
  • Receive an email; and
  • Drag email to your Task list in Chandler; OR

• • Drag email to you Chandler IMAP folder in your email client
  • Email shows up in your Dashboard in Chandler

Proposed Design Priorities for Communications and Sharing Features, as supported by Usage Scenarios:

1 Import/Export Files

• Useful to everybody for getting information out of exising task management and calendaring systems into Chandler.
• Busy Body and Apex/Assistant: download a calendar for a conference they're attending and import it into Chandler so they can plan out what sessions they want to go to. Coordinate session attendance with Casual Collaborators via Sharing, Email and Scooby.

2 Drag and dropping items from your email client into your Chandler.

• Hub receives an email full of questions from an Individual Contributor, need to keep track of it as a mini-project in Chandler, deconstruct it and iterate on it over time.
• Tour Coordinator receives 10 requests for School Tour applications for different Tours. She has a Collection for each Tour in Chandler and needs to keep track of them there.
• Project manager receives 5 updates to an Excel spreadsheet that keeps track of progress on projects. She needs to add them into her Spreadsheet collection so she can keep track of them and remember to update the spreadsheet by next week's deadline.
• Assistant receives a meeting request for Apex via email. They want to add it directly to Apex's calendar.

3 Receiving items from other Chandler clients or via Web access

• Hub collaborating with Busy Body to send an agenda for a meeting
• Hub collaborating with Busy Body to send out a message to the group (e.g. strategy list emails)
• Apex assigns tasks to Assistant, Assistant edits and updates task with progress and questions
• Individual contributors update project task list with status and comments via Scooby
• Group updates Office calendar with PTO times via Scooby

4 Receiving items from other Chandler clients or via Web access in your Email client.

• Notifies Ecosystem users of the above scenarios, so they know to check the desktop client or go to view items via Scooby

5 Replying to and Forwarding items from Chandler.

• Replying to emails that are on the task list because they need a reply
• Coordinator/Assistant forwards

6 Receiving Chandler items as SMS on your mobile device.

• A way to keep on top of tasks and your schedule while you're running errands

7 Getting flagged items from you email client into your Chandler via subscribing to an IMAP folder.

• Users often flag items today to keep track of tasks that come in the form of email. Some users have figured out that they can see a folder of all their flagged items. We could easily turn this affordance into a way for people to flag items to be moved into Chandler.

8 Publishing Chandler items to IMAP folders, so you can access them when you're traveling. (This could be satisfied via Scooby.) 9 Receiving Chandler items into your RSS reader.

• Mostly so you can see a log of all changes to shared collections, from outside of Chandler. Explicit Updates are already handled via email.

10 Pulling down items into Chandler via RSS.

• Busy Body subscribing to public events calendars.

-- MimiYin - 25 May 2006