Re: What is GNOME office?

[grib billgribble com (Bill Gribble)]

On Fri, Nov 17, 2000 at 09:51:47PM +1100, Martin Sevior wrote:
> The approach we've tried to take in Abiword is to make each feature we
> implement as least as good as good as MS Word. If we're unsure how to
> present a UI feature to the user and there is no clear better way to do
> it we copy MS Word.

That's basically what we do with gnucash these days.  We look at
Quicken and MS Money and their manuals a lot.  That doesn't tweak my
conscience in the least, because IMO much of interface design is just
figuring out what to steal and how other people addressed similar
problems.

I don't like the overall feel of most Windows applications, so we
don't try to steal that, but there are some particularly vicious
interface problems in every application that you just aren't going to
get too far on if you don't understand the prior art.  

In gnucash, that's the "register" (where you look at and edit a list
of all your financial transactions).  This is a singularly unpleasant
interface problem... in short, too many boxes with too many mutual
interactions and no real "obvious" set of semantics.  Dave Peticolas
(who does most of the register coding) finally just gave in and talked
to a veteran Quicken user who explained what she expected and was used
to.  We still haven't completely solved our register's problems, but
without Quicken we wouldn't have nearly as much leverage on it.

b.g.