Re: user levels, disclosure triangles, and preferences

[Darin Adler <darin bentspoon com>]

On Wednesday, June 6, 2001, at 07:13  PM, James M. Cape wrote:

> Strictly speaking, you're right. User levels don't directly break the
> grouping of items.
>
> What I should've said was that they break up the conceptual model the
> user has of the group, becase the user level is outside virtually all
> groups, but it still should be in the user's conceptual model of every
> group.

I think I see what you mean. Once you have a user level concept, you need 
to be able to change it everywhere.

> > > I think user levels as used by Nautilus affect *only* the prefs
> > > dialog, not the UI features. That addresses at least part of your
> > > objections, right?
>
> Well, there is the file properties dialog (the special flags section is
> hidden in all but advanced), but other than that, this does address part
> of my objections, yes.

This may seem like sophistry to you, but in this case, there's a 
preference to control whether you see the special flags section. So 
beginners and intermediates can't see this section at all, and experts can 
see the hidden preference to turn it on or off. This logical explanation 
doesn't change anything though. The fact remains that the pane is only 
visible if you have the user level set to expert, which is your point I 
guess.

    -- Darin