Bring back the alphabetical index. Would it be so bad to have an extra feature?

Whoever put that thing together did an excellent job. I can’t understate how much that feature helped me out as a student trying to learn the software. It was my primary method for finding the tutorials on functions, especially since then I wasn’t completely familiar with what some were called. I’d guess at the first few letters in the index and then I’d visually scan the middle column for “MATLAB Function”. As a bonus, I’d get exposed to other functions in the process. For example, seeing “image” as I’m looking for “imag”.

“Interesting, so there’s an image function, too. I’ll have to remember that for later.”

The “search” option is okay, but just like any other search tool it returns a lot of junk the user isn’t interested in.

On a side note, tell whoever it may concern that I find the function tutorials extremely helpful. Simple, intuitive examples with concise text. I like how the wording is usually kept to a minimum.

I don’t have a lot to add to what I’ve said previously about the index tab. We realize now that the index tab’s incremental search feature was popular, and we’ve tried to address that in R2010a by adding search suggestions to the Help browser’s search field. Do the search suggestions still not fit into your workflow? In the case you’re describing, I’d imagine the suggestions would drive you right to the function reference page you’re looking for. If that’s not happening, or if the search suggestions are otherwise inconvenient for you, we’d love to hear about it. If you found the index tab useful beyond just its incremental search feature, we’d love to hear about that, too. From our point of view, though, the index didn’t add a lot of functionality that a good search feature couldn’t also provide.

I’ve tried the function browser as suggested for a week or two now and I can see how a development team would see it more or less as the help-index replacement. I’ll take you through my workflow to illustrate my problems with it, however:
pre-2009b:
-Coding, coding…er…do I place my temporary variable first or second in order to get the index w/ the min() function?… (index window is usually already in focus) type m-i-n, enter. There’s my info. I go back to my code and since my help window is visible at the same time, I don’t have to remember anything when going back to coding. All told: 0.8s

post-2009b
-same issue with min(). Well, I’ve got two options.
Option (1) I can go up and click the function reference and type ‘min’ (btw, I’m guessing due to the search nature of the function browser, the results take about 1/2 second before popping up which I surprisingly find very annoying), click on the function and there’s the cute “help-lite” window, only the syntax option I’m looking for isn’t there at the top, and I have to scroll down to the bottom to find the info I’m looking for. I then click back to my editor but…poof! both little windows are gone! oops! Well, I get smart about things then and tear off the function browser and after clicking the function I click ‘more help’ (which is two clicks more than I needed w/ the old way). Now here is the old FRP I’m used to. If it’s positioned in a way that I can see it and my editor, I can click back to my code and continue. But…the function browser shares focus w/ the editor window and now it’s either in the way on top of my code, or it’s in front of the figure window I just created. But I don’t want more target practice with the tiny function browser button next time so I make it smaller and lose a little more screen real estate for my figure window (only, you can’t make the function browser less than 5 lines long). Then, let’s say, I click on the command window to reset a variable while debugging. Oh, well that little help-”not as lite” window that was behind my figure now pops in front because it shares focus with the command window and has the same issues as the function browser. I get frustrated w/ my lack of screen space and get shot down by my supervisor when I try to ask for another monitor.

Option (2) If I’m really smart and if I really am dealing with a simple function like min() and not trying to find one whose name I don’t already know, then I can press F1 after typing min( in my code. There’s the little help-”not as lite” window as in Option (1) with less clicking. Nice. So I click back to my code and realize that it now shares focus with the editor window (instead of the command window like above) and has the same issues as the function browser in obscuring my figure windows and/or code.

Now, as you already stated, I can select under preferences to have the results pop up in the help browser and for the example I gave with min(), setting that to ‘open in help browser’ and then using F1 really is faster than the old way, so I do have to give props for that.

But for the other 60% of my help documentation browsing it just seems like if the function browser and the FRP were together in their own window with separate focus, that would be perfect. But I suppose that’s how the old help w/ the index was (with less contextual lag).

I do appreciate the challenges of making software and coding flow more ergonomic, but just as I still rebel against the auto-tool select option in LabVIEW, I find the elimination of the help index to be a step backward for me. In general, I’m all about adding features. But in my own experience I don’t take a feature out (even if it’s a stupid feature in need of rewriting) if it works for and is efficient for at least 1 user out there.

Are there other things you miss about the index tab? You mention that it was useful for navigating. How so? If you can provide a specific example where the index was especially useful for navigating the documentation (rather than just finding something), it would be a big help to us.

What, specifically, do you find “clunky” about the help browser and/or the function browser? I’m assuming that the loss of the incremental search in the Help browser is part of what you’re getting at here, but the function browser does have incremental search in R2009b. Are there other things that feel clunky to you?