Tips on what to avoid

["Oskar Liljeblad" <osk hem passagen se>]

Tips on what should be avoided in GUIs:

(This is stuff to discuss, not my final opinions. If I have missed an
important aspect, or anything else, don't hesitate to flame. :)

- Dialog boxes with only "Yes" and "No" buttons should be avoided.
Try to use "OK" and "Cancel" where possible.

- The help submenu should not be right justified.
There's really not much point in right justifying it. The help menu should
be the last menu though.

- Don't make buttons too big.
Do not add extra vertical or horizontal padding to buttons. Icons in
standard buttons ("OK", "Cancel", "Apply", ...) should be avoided. The
question mark has little connection with "Help", and in many countries in
Europe the "v" and "x" symbols aren't used to indicate "Yes" and "No" (or
whatever they indicate), AFAIK.

If possible, the size of buttons shouldn't be relative to the size of the
window.

Take a look at the buttons in some MC dialog boxes (or was it somewhere
else?). These buttons are much too big, and could be made much smaller even
when they contain an icon. (Not everyone uses 1024x768 or higher!)  If, in
the MC case, the size of buttons are determined solely by GTK, I think icons
for these standard buttons should be removed.

(As a side note, color indication is better for OK and Cancel buttons. Green
or blue stands for "OK", "Go", while red stands for "Stop", "Abort",
"Cancel". I don't know if this is possible to implement at all, but I recall
there was something like this in Win98.)

Oskar Liljeblad (osk@hem.passagen.se)