Re: [Usability] 'Capplets' (was Re: background/font capplets)

[Seth Nickell <snickell stanford edu>]

The best suggestion that pops into my head is to call the general "area"
of GNOME the "Desktop Preferences". I would refer people to specific
preference pages in the documentation based on the Applications (e.g.
"Applications->Preferences->Background").

-Seth

On Thu, 2002-04-04 at 16:05, John Sheehan wrote:
> 
> 
> Ian McKellar wrote:
> > 
> > On Thu, 2002-04-04 at 14:07, John Sheehan wrote:
> > > To pick up on this earlier thread .... So, if we can no longer use 'capplets',
> > > what common name should we use to refer to system preferences.  'Control Center'
> > > was a good handle with which to collectively group these preferences (like MS's
> > > Control Panel) but that is now also defunct.
> > >
> > > In Gnome 1.4 you could document along the lines of 'You can set the desktop
> > > background using the Background capplet in the Control Center'.
> > >
> > > 'Preferences' as they are called in the Applications menu is too unspecific.
> > > 'Property dialogs' doesn't work.  GNOME Preferences ? System Preferences ?
> > > Global Preferences ?
> > 
> > On classic MacOS each of the "capplets" are called a "Control Panel"
> > (well, initially there was *the* control panel which was a single dialog
> > but now there are many of those) and the folder that holds them is
> > called "Control Panels". So perhaps we could call the collection of
> > "Property Dialog"s "Property Dialogs". I don't really like that name but
> > its pretty clear that you find property dialogs inside the property
> > dialogs folder.
> > 
> 
> It is not correct to equate preferences with properties.  Eugene O'Connor's distinction
> in the Gnome documentation glossary is:
> 
> preference: A characteristic of a program which a user can modify to alter how the 
>             program interacts with the user.
> property:   A characteristic of an inactive entity. 
> 
> If instead of "Property Dialogs, we were to use "Preference Dialogs" that would not
> distinguish between the dialog to change the desktop background and the dialog for 
> Wanda preferences.  We need a name which distinguishes the former from the latter.
> 
> John
> 
> > I think using a name thats distinct from the name thats used to describe
> > the dialogs used to configure applications would be good.
> > 
> > Ian
> > 
> >   ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >                        Name: signature.asc
> >    signature.asc       Type: application/pgp-signature
> >                 Description: This is a digitally signed message part
> _______________________________________________
> Usability mailing list
> Usability gnome org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/usability