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Pretty much every time I go to use some indreams functionality, I go to the wrong place. Every time I go there I think "yeah I'll click here to do that thing" and it's always the wrong one. I think perhaps this is because of the somewhat ambiguous/similar meanings to the tabs.
There are 2 areas where I can interact with things in-game in some way: Activities and Tools.
(It's about to get semantic up in here, I'm afraid. But that's kind of what this post is about.)
Activities
...as in "events that are currently happening." From the name I would expect it to have things like what I currently have open, what I'm currently editing, ways to aid in what I am already doing in-game... functions related to what I am actually doing right this second.
What it contains:
> Notifications - containing what others have before this moment, related to my own creations. Things like likes, comments, people following me, etc.
> Following feed - containing what others have done before this moment, that I have said I want to be notified about.
These are all notifications of different types, but are not grouped together as a "Notifications" area. In-game, the corresponding area is also called "Activity," but I don't think of it under that name. I think of it as "notifications." It has a notifications bell, it shows me my notifications, I "go to my notifications" to find something someone in chat has sent me, etc.
* My proposal would be to name this "Notifications."
Tools
...as in "an object used to do perform some action." From the name I would expect it to have things enabling me to do things or start things I cannot in-game. For example, importing audio from my laptop. (If you look for this function in either of the menus you won't find it; it is all by itself for some reason. A lot of people don't find it and ask for help to even get started with that tool.)
What it contains:
> Live - Showing me:
- The current status of what I'm doing in Dreams (scene/dream I am currently playing / editing a creation, etc.). This is the activity I am currently engaged in. I would expect this to appear in "Activities."
- My online status. This is my current activity regarding my connection to PSN. Again, I would guess this description of my activity would be shown in "Activities."
- Connection diagnostics. This is something I use to get something done--to test the connection to my console. It could make sense this is in "Tools."
- Text Entry. This is somewhat of a grey area, but as it only appears when I am currently in the middle of the activity of editing text in-game, I'd probably expect this to be in "Activities." Or perhaps in the tab marked "editing," as I am trying to edit the text.
> Editing - allowing me to:
- Select a creation I own and edit its details.
- Go to the "Assets" tab. In game-dev "assets" refers to content you use to make other things--in Dreams the equivalent would be "elements." This is not the meaning used, however.
- "Download icon." The "icon" referred to is not an icon as referred to in the rest of Dreams, the characters rendering shapes and pictograms. That is not the meaning used here. It's referring to the thumbnail of the creation as an icon.
With the way things are organised currently, I each time I do remember that Activities doesn't mean current events. So my brain assumes it must help me with activities I'm currently doing in-game, but that's dangerously close to "tools." So then the difference must be tools for doing new things are in "tools" and tools for helping with things I'm currently already doing are "activities." But that's not right either.
As they're potentially somewhat interchangeable words in this context, I do try to work through which one I'm meant to look in, but thinking it through logically to go where I want to do leads me down the wrong path every time.
It would be awesome if there could just be a very clearly named: "Notifications" area with my notifications, "Tools" area with tools for doing things (with no tools hanging out in other places), and "Activity" area that shows me anything to do with my current activity... I feel like it would be a lot less frustrating, easier for newcomers to find things, etc.