Re: To answer your question about the upcoming Style-Guide...

["Ben 'The Con Man' Kahn" <xkahn cybersites com>]

On Fri, 24 Jul 1998, Dan Kaminsky wrote:

> >Preben Randhol writes:
> > > How would you explain to a person that he cannot insert two spaces in
> > > a row in LyX ?
> >
> >When they try to do it, LyX plays back an audio file explaining why it
> >won't have the effect they expect.  If they correct it while the audio
> >file is playing, immediately cease the playback.

> >Is that a pain to do?  Yes.
> >Does it require expenditure of resources?  Yes.
> >Does that matter, if it's the best way to help the user?  No.
> >How do we know it's the best way?  Testing, and more testing.
> >Do our opinions matter?  No.  Only testing matters.
> >Should we shut up with our opinions, then?  Yes.

> There's something called educated guesses.

> Do users hate something interrupting their thoughts and blabbing at
> them?  OH YES.  We see how much users hate the Office Assistant. 

> What *might* work for LyX is, if you try to hit space twice, a "relevant
> help-file" box on the titlebar lights up and starts "cooling down", reaching
> original cold after ten seconds.  Click it, and it directs you to a specific
> screenplay that shows you how to specify there should be an additional
> distance between two letters, or how to make an indented list, or whatever.
> Hyperlinked screenplays--works for me :-)


	Of course, Word tried this.  They had a small LAMP icon which
turned yellow when you hit a feature you might be confused about.  If you
didn't click it, it eventually went white again.  Clicking on it, brought
up something that looked like a toolbar, but with a two line help.  You
could also leave that toolbar up and you wouldn't have to click the lamp.  

	They got rid of this in later versions...  I wonder why?

						-Ben

------------------------------------ |\      _,,,--,,_  ,) ----------
Benjamin Kahn                        /,`.-'`'   -,  ;-;;'
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          Meet Linux: Forrest Gump as an operating system.