most dirs are missing

[pm100]

I just did cargo install diskonaut on my rasp pi.

when I run it it only displays a few dirs , for example when i start it in the root of a cargo project only the target dir shows up, no src dir, no files.

Am I doing something wrong

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ cargo -V
cargo 1.46.0 (149022b1d 2020-07-17)
pi@raspberrypi:~ $ rustc -V
rustc 1.46.0 (04488afe3 2020-08-24)
pi@raspberrypi:~ $ uname -a
Linux raspberrypi 4.19.66-v7+ #1253 SMP Thu Aug 15 11:49:46 BST 2019 armv7l GNU/Linux
pi@raspberrypi:~ $ cat /etc/os-release
PRETTY_NAME="Raspbian GNU/Linux 9 (stretch)"
NAME="Raspbian GNU/Linux"
VERSION_ID="9"
VERSION="9 (stretch)"
VERSION_CODENAME=stretch
ID=raspbian
ID_LIKE=debian
HOME_URL="http://www.raspbian.org/"
SUPPORT_URL="http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianForums"
BUG_REPORT_URL="http://www.raspbian.org/RaspbianBugs"
pi@raspberrypi:~ $

[imsnif]

Hmm, very odd. Could it be that the other dirs are too small to render? Can you zoom in with + to see them?

[pm100]

aha, thats it . Observations -

• there is no way for me to know that I might need to zoom.
• There is no way for me to know that + will do zoom
• This display I get after zooming is not obvious .How am I zooming, i tried to understand but still dont get whats being selected as the zoom.
• small dirs and small files are treated entirely differently,

suggestions

• use 'x = small items' for both, or maybe d / f
• message says "x = small items + to zoom"

not sure what to do about the non obviousness of what zoom does.

PS shouldnt there be a 'help' button - I tried ? and h

[imsnif]

First, thanks very much for your observations. I feel the UX of diskonaut is very important, and would very much love to improve it where it's not up to par.

* there is no way for me to know that I might need to zoom.

Yes, you are right in this unfortunate edge-case. :/ In most cases, you would see the Small Files area rendered on the screen. Which should give you some indication that you are able to zoom in to see more (or all) of them. Here, the small files take up so little space in comparison to the other files that there isn't even room to render them on the screen (without "lying" to the user and having them take up significantly more space than they do).

* There is no way for me to know that + will do zoom

Hum, well - it should show up in the controls line on the bottom of the screen, but this control line gets truncated to show the more important controls (arrows, enter, esc, backspace) when the terminal window isn't big enough to show them all. Not the best experience, I agree. More on this below.

* This display I get after zooming is not obvious .How am I zooming, i tried to understand but still dont get whats being selected as the zoom.

Right now, the visual indication you get is on the title line. You'll see something like (+1 larger file(s), zoom out to show). If this was not obvious to you, it means it's definitely not obvious enough. My suggestion would be to flash it for a second with a green background (something like we do if you try to ESC beyond the parent dir). Do you think that would make it clearer? Do you have other ideas?

* small dirs and small files are treated entirely differently,

suggestions

* use 'x = small items' for both, or maybe d / f

* message says "x = small items + to zoom"

I really tried to find a name that would mean "both files and folders" but couldn't in this case. :) "Small Files" are supposed to be "Small Files and Folders". Maybe we should just change it to that? What do you mean by them being treated differently though?

PS shouldnt there be a 'help' button - I tried ? and h

Personally, I try to avoid help screens in apps as much as possible, since they often signify the app is in a level of complexity that might start putting off users (eg. twitter/github/reddit/facebook/etc. don't need a help screen, you just pick up what you can do with them while using them). I'm not saying I'm 100% against it, but I'd like to explore other solutions first.

I like your idea of including it with the small files. It's on its own line, so should be visible even at the minimum app width. This still won't be ideal in your situation above, because we can't even see the Small Files on screen. Maybe change it to:
(x = Small files), <+/-/0> to zoom in/out/reset? What do you think?

[pm100]

i get what was happeining now