28.1. A first impression
The application’s user interface is, unsurprisingly, built around the notion of a context. It’s roles are displayed in a single view except for its user roles (a view being a presentation that encompasses the entire screen). Let’s call the former the main view and the latter the users view. Regardless of the view, a bar at the bottom will be visible sporting five buttons. One of these will take the user to the users view. A small button in the top left corner of that view allows the user to return back to the main view. This is not so much navigating, as switching views of the same thing (that is, context).
In the center of the bar is a button that will bring up a panel from the bottom that partly covers the screen. It lists any number of roles that have been put there before by a copy action. In other words, this panel is what we ususally think of as the clipboard. More on copy-and-paste later.
The two buttons on the left are for navigating to two particularly important contexts:
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the first carries the notion of recent activity. It shows two rolled-up panes:
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contexts that have been recently visited (put on screen), and
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notifications that alert the user to actions of his peers.
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The second provides a more stable structure that allows for navigation, not unlike the table of contents of a book. Components are
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Pinned starting points (more about this later)
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Apps (indexed root contexts, in technical parlance)
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App stores.
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Immediately left of the clipboard button is the users button discussed above. Finally, on the far right, is a back-button. This is meant for navigation: it brings back the previous context in the two views.
The GUI is completed by a hamburger menu on the top left.
This is, in broad outlines, the entire application. Now lets dive into details and see how things work out.