Hi all

[Kevin Cullis <kevincu orci com>]

I've just joined the list and thought I'd introduce myself.  I live in
Denver with my wife and I've been using computers since the first 512k
Mac (I know, but we all have to start somewhere). I have a Masters in
Administration with a background in QA (more than just testing software
and includes UI) and have 5 years of selling computers to business
people.  I've also been a manager of large organizations (greater than
300 people in 14 different job titles) and focus on reducing cycle time
of processes.  I agree with the direction of GNOME, Eazel, and Linux and
want to contribute to this endeavor.  Some of you may be younger than I
am, but I hope to learn from you as much as you will learn from me, or
we'll learn together in a discovery mode.  Anyway, I'm here to help, at
least from a UI perspective.  I'm not a programmer, but I am learning
shell scripting and REs in my spare time.  If I critique something, I'll
also give a suggestion to how it might be fixed so as not to be
considered just a complainer.

So, since I've just joined, here are my comments of using GNOME so far
(SuSe 6.4.

1. On the taskbar list, the GNOME icon (the foot) is highlighted when I
select the task and has a highlight of yellow "lightening" around the
foot.  I consider this a waste of screen real estate.  Might I suggest
getting rid of the foot icon and allow for the shading of the selected
task to be a "colored" or "banded" with a selected color.  If not, how
about the icon of the program is in it's place.

2. The GNOME File Commander has a UI feature which I think should be
reconsidered.  The preferences menu should be changed to have the on/off
selected features in the menu itself rather than a dialog box or as a
button next to the display icons (unless there are other considerations
of this). For example, there are times that I'm working and DON'T want
to look at the hidden files that I HAVE to go to the preferences files
to make the changes and then back again when I need to look for them.  A
menu item of this would speed things up.  Only three items in the
settings:preferences should be a dialog because you have to input
something.  Everything else is on/off and should be a menu item.  They
should be like the Layout:Sort by... menu for those items which require
input.  Juset a suggestion.

3. When Macs (and Windows) start up a program, the mouse pointer has the
sand timer come up or a watch had rotating.  When I've shown GNOME to
first time users, that's what they first ask, "Is the program started?" 
A task bar should be "initialized" to show the "startup" of the program
until it is ready to be used.  This should be a two step process: task
bar is initiated and is "unuseable" until the program is ready, then it
should be like normal task bars.

4. The #8 comment in Widgets and Behaviors is confusing.  First
impression is that Ok and Yes are the same thing.  What gives?

5. I use Star Office and the menu for Fonts and Fonts sizes stinks in
the word processor.  It takes too much of my time to change things
because of the contrained or small scroll bar.  Use the full screen real
estate to select things or let the scroll bars adjust to fill length of
the screen.  Along the same lines, I absolutely hate the More... menu on
long menu items.  This is where the Mac version is superior, a down
arrow for more below and an up arrow for more above.  I have to be TOO
accurate to select things I want.

That all for now.

-- 
Kevin
--
Success is never final, failure is never fatal, unless you quit on
others and yourself.
If you get married to your ideas, you'll go through the pangs of divorce
when you're proven wrong.

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