Re: Close buttons in dialogs

[Brad Taylor <brad getcoded net>]

On Tue, 2009-07-28 at 07:07 +0100, Sérgio Neves wrote:
> Hi,
> Since we are talking about close buttons, I don't want to miss the 
> oportunity to ask why the majority of applications use only one button, the 
> close, when in fact they should use an ok button and a cancell button. I ask 
> this not because Ms Windows applications uses it all the time, but because 
> there is one rule of interface design saying that it may be possible for us 
> to undo any changes we have made. Clearly, most of gnome applications don't 
> obey this rule. Why does it happen?

These are called "instant apply" windows.  The GNOME HIG has a whole
section on when and where they are recommended to be used:

http://library.gnome.org/devel/hig-book/stable/windows-utility.html.en

Of course, debating the HIG's finer points is good, but let's use the
existing document as part of our discussion.

Best,

-Brad