Re: apply ?

["Dan Kaminsky" <effugas best com>]

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Vogt <tom@lemuria.org>
To: gnome-gui-list@gnome.org <gnome-gui-list@gnome.org>
Date: Sunday, August 02, 1998 1:57 AM
Subject: apply ?


>I want to toss an idea into the list for discussion.
>
>about the "apply" button...
>
>I believe that beast is a very bad idea. I agree with the interface hall of
>shame there and would propose the following changes:
>
>
>OK      -       does what we expect: make changes and exit window
>
>Cancel  -       should cancel ALL changes done since the window was opened
>
>Preview -       apply changes, but changes will be undone by hitting cancel
>
>
>dialogs which have a tendency to stay open for a long time, with changes
>being done several times over time should have a forth button that does
what
>"apply" does now - as OK, but without closing the window. I'm looking for a
>good name. "Save" would be fitting, but I don't like it.


Why not just have cancel return to the state before the dialog was opened,
and add an undo button(with control-z keyboardability) that becomes ungreyed
if you hit apply?

Better yet, add multi-level undo/redo(should be a C3 style thing everywhere,
with undo referring to focus-app) to repeatedly accessed dialogs w/ a
preview checkbox that when unchecked returns the original object status to
pre-dialog conditions?  This is similar to how Photoshop does it.  If cancel
was pressed, the preview-unchecked condition would be regenerated.

It would:

A)  Retain the original functionality of cancel(forget this dialog ever
happened)
B)  Prevent dialog thrashing, where the same box is opened over and over and
over again.
C)  Provide a means for evolving status in dialog boxes--in other words, you
can apply through a number of different choices.  Something like a web
browser's arrows might be a good way to show this graphically--above the
apply button, a left arrow and a right arrow would signify go back and go
forward.