Re: Application names in menus

[Sander Vesik <Sander Vesik Sun COM>]

On Thu, 1 Aug 2002 snickell stanford edu wrote:

> > Actually, if you take a look at the names of the items in File->New,
> > functional names should pretty easily present themselves. So you
> > would
> > have 'OpenOffice.org Text Document', 'OpenOffice.org Spreadsheet'
> > ...
> 
> I think this a fantastic point. Why should the application menu contain
> the technobabble name when OpenOffice doesn't use that name internally
> for creating those types? The reason is because internally to a program
> people think "functional", but when it comes to adding items to the
> desktop menus, people always seem to get sidetracked by branding and
> marketing concerns rather than functionality. I have news! The
> applications menu is the gateway to your program, don't boobytrap it.
> 

This is just a question of boundaries - inside the suite its is the
question of 'what new frame type to open' while outside it is 'what
program do you want to launch'. This may not apply to essentialy
identiless interchangable components, but otherwise yes. 

> > with the the added benefit that what you see from the UI is the same
> > as
> > the gnome menus. But there may not be a need for such long names -
> > just
> > create a submenu 'OpenOffice.org 1.0' and put the shorter names
> > under
> > that. 
> 
> This is what windows does. Its evil, and probably driven by marketing.

Its not really 'what windows does' - its just the default what a lot of 
installers on windows do. if you pointthem at a pre-existing folder they
will happily drop their entries in there. It may be marketing driven but
that doesn't make it evil.

> Users shouldn't have to drill down another level (on a TechnoBabble 2.3
> name) to access applications they want to use...particularly
> applications as essential and key to many people's desktop use as Word
> processor, spreadsheet, etc.

The problme being that users want to have TechnoBabble 1.2, TechnoBabble
2.3 and TechnoBabble 2.4rc1 installed, and appear in a comprehencible way
not just three sets of three identical looking items 'Technobabble'
'Technobabble plugin manager' and 'Technobabble updater' from which you
can't tell which applies to which version.

> 
> -Seth
> 

	Sander

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