I have been using Xolox for about 10 days now, and I have been using GNUtella (Bearshare & Limewire) for over 6 months now. Here are a list of suggested features, changes, bug fixes, etc:

1) (Search / Transfers / Files) Buttons: These are huge on a 1024x768 display, and they are ugly too! I suggest changing to a standard tabbed pane, which is more intuitive to long time and newbie computer users.

2) Files Pane: This pane should be changed to what is effectively the "My Files" pane, which lists the users shared files and allows them to change the shared directories and manipulate their shared files on a very simplified high-level interface.

3) (File / Tools / Help) Pull Down Menus: It would simplify the entire application to just lose the pull down menus entirely. Hard code the preferences into the application because most users don't change these preferences (with exception of shared directories), and many of those who change these settings choose less than optimal values. The shared directories preference should be moved to the "Files" pane described above in suggest #2.

4) Table Widgets: The table widgets are funky and annoying. I am not sure what GUI toolkit Xolox uses, but the fact that the table widget does not have real-time or WYSIWYG scrolling is just plane annoying (it is so Windows 3.1). Make the scrollbar for the tables scroll in real-time.

5) CPU Usage: I am sharing 10GB of data, which consists mostly of thousands upon thousands of MP3s. I also have a list of about 100 files that are all queued to downloaded, and on average, 6 are actually being downloaded. I run an overclocked celeron300a, full SCSI system with 128MB of ram... running windows 98 SE. After Xolox kicks into high gear, downloading 6+ files at a time, the CPU usage sky rockets and my computer becomes almost totally unresponsive to user interaction. I am not sure exactly what Xolox does that requires so much CPU usage... it is perfectly exceptable for such a program to hog your bandwidth, but hogging the CPU is another story.

6) Auto Update Bug: I am running 1.11, which Xolox auto-updated to from Xolox 1.09 (pretty cool feature... though it gives the Xolox team allot of power and creates a possibly nightmarishly scary security hole). Anyway, Xolox crashed when I closed it after it had downloaded its update. It gave some "bad pointer error". Sorry I don't have more specific information. Anyway, despite the crash, upon booting Xolox up again, it ran through its auto update successfully.

7) Auto Update Transparency: The Auto Update should be a documented and optional feature, and I like how it downloads the update as if it were just another GNUtella file (does it actually make use of GNUtella for sharing the local copy?). However, it would be best to make the auto update feature almost entirely transparent. The application would have a far more polished feel if it hid the command line part of the update, which for 1.11 required me to "press any key" twice. This is a nitpicky complaint, but an idiot novice user would only be confused by such events. Make the entire process hidden, but keep the feature documented and optional.

8) resumeinfo.txt: This is a very important file for Xolox, or at least, it can stop Xolox from working when it becomes corrupt. Currently, because of all of the content on my harddrive, I have very low diskspace. I an continously archiving content to CDR, in order to free up space. However, Xolox can corrupt the resumeinfo.txt file when your system has very low diskspace. Last night for example, I left Xolox to do its work, downloading over 100 files. To Xolox's compliment, it was far more successful with its downloading than I anticipated. I left it with over a GB of free disk space, and it must have used it up somewhere in the middle of the night. When it tried to write the resumeinfo.txt file, it failed (because of low diskspace), threw some error, and corrupted the resumeinfo.txt file. Sure this problem can be avoided, but it would make for a far more rock-solid program, if Xolox treated the resumeinfo.txt file more carefully, as if it were a transaction aware database. Each time an entry is made to the file, it should only succeed if the entire entry is made successfully. In my situation, the resumeinfo.txt file was about 2MB in size, and it looked like it failed halfway through the creation of a file entry. For a novice user, this would be the end of Xolox, but it just requires a careful editting of the resumeinfo.txt file. Anyway, make sure to handle the file more carefully so that it doesn't become corrupted during File IO exceptions.

9) Download Transfers - Download Status Field: This field, while informative is cluttered, messy, and potentially confusing for novice users. This field, along with the new "Average Speed" field are probably overkill for the typical user. As a P2P user, I want to know what files I am downloading, their size, my progress, and a fairly accurate expected time. I don't need to know who I am downloading from, the network throughput that I am getting (especially since it is so erratic), nor do I want to know such things as CPU usage, etc... I don't care about the underlying network, I care about getting my content ASAP and with as little effort on my end as possible.

10) Clear Finished and Aborted transfers: This checkbox shouldn't even exist. Almost all typical users will use the checked value, and therefore the option only serves to clutter and complicate what could be the most simple GNUtella GUI.

11) Status Bar / Log / Whatever its called: At the bottom of the screen, a auto-dynamically sized status bar periodically tells me when files are completely downloaded, when searches are run, etc... The two most annoying things about this status bar are: it grows automatically which disrupts my interaction with tables above it, and it tells me when Xolox is searching for mirrors for files that I am already downloading. The first gripe has to do with the fact that the status bar gets in my way when I am trying to interact with the GUI (specifically the table scrollbars). The second gripe deals with how the Xolox application violates its key feature: automatic transparent segmented downloads. Segmented or multisource downloading should be automatic and COMPLETELY transparent. If you are going to keep the status bar, then at least don't have it tell me every 30 seconds that Xolox is searching for this or that keyword. I don't want or need to know that. I JUST WANT XOLOX TO GET MY FILES ASAP.

12) Lower lefthand time/clock display: Why does it exist? Most windows users have their system set to display a clock on the task bar on the windows explorer window manager. Another clock on my desktop only serves to further clutter my desktop.


Final Note:

Xolox is simply the best GNUtella application that I have ever used. Right now, I don't see a reason to go back to Bearshare or Limewire, EVER AGAIN! Hopefully my suggestions above are taken with a grain of salt, and only used to furthur improve Xolox.

I would like to thank the Xolox team for their great piece of software. It is only a matter of time before Bearshare and Limewire begin to lose market share of GNUtella users.

A very well-stated critique -- but I do disagree on a few points.

Number 10 suggests that the GUI should automatically clear completed or aborted transfers. I actually prefer the current functionality because it makes it easier to see when a new mp3 has finished dowloading so that I can immediately play it from the xolox gui. Recently I dowloaded several different versions of the same song (and old jazz standard) and it would have been confusing if the list of downloads dissappeared as they completed...

Here's my feature request:
I would like for the "search" text field to retain the last entry so that it can be edited for the next search. (Currently it erases itself.) An additional refinement would be for the field to be a combo box listing the last N searches (like how IE does autocomplete.)


Thanks for the great software...

I would like to see the status bar on the bottom of the search results moved somewhere else or atleast have an option to disable it (unless there is and i havent noticed it).
I was trying to scroll down through the list and i have to scroll so far and then lets say read that page and then scroll a little further. Well when i took by hand off the button, read the page and then went to push the "\/" button to scroll some more the status bar kept moving upwards and changing the position of the button.
Even giving the status window a consistant size would eleviate the problem. anything to keep it from moving on me.

Hi there!

First of all I have to thank the XOLOX team for this great piece of software!
What I miss is the ability to search for files with boolean expressions like I do it on www. I'd like to ad an AND, OR and especially a NOT. I already know this is not implemented in the gnutella-protocol, but I still like to have this feature

moffen