Re: A call to action / Guidelines

[Liam Quin <liam holoweb net>]

On Mon, Oct 16, 2000 at 01:22:27AM -0600, Kevin Cullis wrote:
> "Christopher D. Beland" wrote:
> > > Where can I find the outline of the Apple Human Interface so that we
> > > can start putting GNOME stuff in it?
[...]
> > Adopting these guidelines for Gnome looks like it would be a
> > monumental task.  It's also not the most straightforward job in the
> 
> True, but if nothings been done, we've got to start somewhere.

The Mac guidelines were written
for a single-application-at-a-time model with a small screen, and
although they have been evolving, I amnot sure they are a good start
for Gnome.  Maybe Arlo will have more insight into that :-)

I'd say, if you are going to start anywhere, look at some of the better
UI work that has been done for Unix.  

For example, the open look style guide was very clearly written and
very helpful.  It also helps to try and enforce some of the guidelines
in the toolkits, particularly on X where UI consistency has in the
past been very sloppy.

I never liked the OSF/Motif style guides - they seemed very
derivative of OS/2 1.5 Persentation Manager (which they were, of course).

I think there is a need for a document that can be read by people
developing applications, and that answers questions like,
* which mouse button brings up a menu? 1, 3 or shift-control-2?
* where do you put the "save preferences" button?
* how does a user reset an application fo "factory defaults"?
* what keybindings work in text fields
* how do i initiate a drag?  How do I know where I can drop things?
  (oen look was revised to include drag widgets and drop panels, to
  help give ffordance to this concept, and that worked quite well in
  that environment)
* how do I calculate a highlight colour for a 3d effect given the
  current fg and bg colours

and so on and so on.  [no, please don't reply to these points, they
are not questions, just examples! :-) ]

In case anyone is interested, the OL books were

OPEN LOOK [tm] Graphical User Interface Application Style Guidelines
Sun Microsystems Inc
Addison Wesley, 1990

and (a less interesting book to me)
OPEN LOOK [tm] Graphical User Interface Functional Speficiation

A lot of the things covered bythe Application Style Guideline book
there, Gnome needs to document too.

Lee (Ankh on IRC)

-- 
Liam Quin - Barefoot in Toronto - liam holoweb net - http://www.holoweb.net/
Ankh: irc.sorcery.net www.valinor.sorcery.net irc.gnome.org www.advogato.org
author, The Open Source XML Database Toolkit, Wiley, August 2000
Co-author, The XML Specification Guide, Wiley, 1999