So? Where are they? Are you telling me that in order to be able to see previous messages I need to sift through hundreds of "conversations"? I honestly can't believe that the developers at Skype had the lack of intelligence to even think of releasing this tripe as a beta without fixing some of the known MAJOR usability issues in 4.0.

I'm afraid so.


The fact that apparently no one from Skype reacted on user feedback on these forums made me expect precisely this.

But it saved me some time after all...I learned about the new beta, looked at some screenshots and decided to wait for v4.2. And to seriously look for an alternative to skype in the meantime.

You can filter for your voicemails in history panel to find them easily.

Wow!

I never tried this until now, that you mentioned it. You certainly can "filter" your voicemail and 8 other events (like , missed calls, incoming calls, outgoing calls, SMS, Instant Messages etc. etc.)

Under the Skype Panel Menu ...

>View >History .....

then look at the drop down Menu ..... >All events

Also, take note of the Menu ... >View .... shortcuts Alt1, Alt2, Alt3 .... to take you to Contacts, Conversations, History.

At the top of our contacts panel we have two tabs, one for All Contacts and the other for Conversations, but a History tab is missing. Is there enough room at the top of the contacts panel to add a History tab? I did like to old Skype 3x version, where I could enable or disable the view of tabs Contacts, Prime, History etc.

Just my thoughts to simple improvements and user friendly features.

Steve

Hmmmm. I didn't see the history button at the bottom of the conversations tab. Thanks for pointing it out. At this time I would like to retract some of the hostility in my previous post and apologize for it. It still has some drawbacks. Lack of skins is one right off the top of my head. Also not being able to delete voicemails is essentially stupid. I will give 4.1 several more days before I make a final verdict.

Oh in the end you chose the right thing saint-francis. i know a lot of people that downgraded to 3.8 after something like 5 minutes, just because they found the v4 too much different! this change is not like xp--->vista, skype is an application, xp is an OS! but i know also a lot of people who at the beginning hated v4 and after a few minutes started to love it, give it a try!
i've sent a feedback comment to this beta a few days ago, now that we are in beta you should listen to us .
major things:
- speed dial
- possibility to customize the background, some themes or things like that and the colour of the font
- possibility to change dimension of font in contact list and mood messages
- expand contact details (and options, like buttons to call and chat) by clicking while in compact mode (like in v3)
- possibility of calling phones from search bar by pressing return, and not clicking
- black icon for real phones
- possibility to delete single history items

It took me a while to come back to version 4 after I could not figure out how to use version 4 as well as I can now.

The voicemails and other calls mixed in together confused me at first too.

Yes, I agree

Speed dial is a major priority for me too. I use a Vosky Call Centre Gateway and my non-Skype home cordless landline phone works well through my gateway to PC Skype version 3 with Speed Dial, but I'm trying to stay with version 4 and hoping for Speed Dial soon to be available.

Although there are Skype (home cordless) phones available and they show Skype contacts on their screen, I still like my gateway device for my standard home cordless phone. Also, Speed Dial is so useful for my Mobile Phone when I make free mobile calls to my home phone, then connect to the gateway to use Speed Dial (from my mobile) to Skype OUT on my PC to other Skype contacts or SkypeOUT numbers (which can be very long numbers with my country code I have to use for local calling).

Steve

Thanks for the feedback.

all has been noted down

OK. After spending some time with 4.1 beta I can say that it is much more usable that 4.0. Still the lack of skins is a let down when coming from 3.8 and not being able to delete voicemails is nonsense. Other than that the rest of the problems I encounter are not going to be fixed. Like the strange way in which "conversations" are organized and displayed. All in all 4.1 is a much greater improvement over 4.0 than I expected it to be.

For the developers:

Please include the ability to delete voicemails in the official release of 4.1.

. Well, i think the concept of conversation is a big improvement, because now i can manage calls, videocalls and IMs in a single window/panel. In 3.8 ims were handled in a separate window, while calls were displayed in a tab. The 4.x way is much smarter, it's true that it opens a new window even if i'm calling a real phone but it's useful to have everything right there without using the main "contact list" window, so even the less experienced people can easily work with skype!

One thing that less experienced people can't do is using compact mode! they click on a contact... and then? Nothing! the contact becomes blue, so it's clear that the program IS working, but there's not any button, and nothing tells them that they must use right click or double click... And this is the biggest problem in 4.x interface! Please fix this, if it is possible.... In the end it's not so difficult for the users to bypass the problem, but it gives me the idea of an incomplete interface, that doesn't focus on usability and "user-friendship" (is this english? ). remember: i'm not a programmer, but i know how computer newbies work, right click or double click shouldn't be used for anything, unless you put a big "right click to interact" string near the contact name, but, since this is impossible and stupid, you should make it possible to work with buttons, like it was in 3.8 . The problem is: is it possible for you to make an interface that shows contact mood message and 2 buttons (call and ims) if you click on his/her/its name ONLY IN COMPACT VIEW? Is skype 4 programmed to have two so different interfaces? (default view is perfect as it is)

Yes Skype 4.x is programmed to have different interfaces compact and default mode.

So people can choose what mode they like the best.

Ok Raul, so my question is:
Is it theoretically possible to have two more different interfaces? For example, as i said, many of us (users) think that in compact mode, clicking on a contact name should expand mood message and show two buttons, one to call and one to send an im (exactly like it was in 3.. but default mode is perfect as it is now! so clicking would have different effects in the two views! If we consider only the contact list panel/window clicking has the same effect in the two views because it makes the space around the contact name blue, is it easy for you to change this status quo and to make two different effects in the contact list? Of course this is only a piece of advice from the community and the decision is yours!

It is possible to have many modes, actually using our public API you could build your own UI for Skype, altough the real Skype clients needs to be there also.

The thing what you point out about compact mode is true on my mind and I'm pushing it a bit.

This is the lamest idea ever.

4.0 = choose between two different badly designed UIs
3.8 = a single simple UI that works

Why would adding complexity while removing usability be a good thing.

And how can you forum mods honestly shovel your answers and think they are good and valid?

Can you please describe what is bad in 4.x UI?

We can improve things when we know what is wrong in the new version on your mind.