[OTR-dev] initial otr usability comments

Greg Troxel gdt at ir.bbn.com
Sat Dec 18 10:41:03 EST 2004


I just installed the gaim plugin, and confess to not reading the
README.  It might help to have INSTALL and USAGE separately, or to
make the usage information be in gaim-otr(1), and perhaps point to
that in the plugin configuration window.  Still, from download to
operational was less than 30 minutes, including porting to NetBSD.

It would be nice to be able to store (locally) per-buddy state that
only encrypted messsages may be sent, and when trying to send do KE
first and then send.  Or, to invoke KE when a chat window is opened.

I would like a little more of a warm fuzzy that traffic is being
encrypted.  Somehow marking the chat window on a per-line basis would
be nice.  Perhaps adding [otr] to the screen name, so it shows up

  joe [otr]: test message

instead of

  joe: test message

If it makes sense to mark authentication, confidentiality, and
repudiability separately (doesn't seem so in this case), then perhaps
[acr], as a stab at a more general interface.

It seems that 'refresh keys' should push the mac keys to enable
forging, this might be pointed out more srongly in the user
documentation.

The JID showed up in a mailto: link, and probably that should be
xmpp:, as it is a separate namespace sort of.  I realize this may be a
gaim issue, and on top of that it is messy.  (My JID is not a valid
email address.)

It seems there should be a way to end a private conversation in such a
way that the other party is told this and it is all graceful.

I don't understand (as a UI issue), how or if when I close a chat
window the MAC keys are disclosed.

It would be nice to be able to use gpg dsa keys for otr such that one
could have a signature on an otr key from the WOT.  For many of the
people that I would like to use OTR with I already have gpg keys that
I believe.



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