Re: Status and documentation proposal...

[colin z robertson <c z robertson ndirect co uk>]

On Wed, Jan 17, 2001 at 02:00:30PM -0800, Ryan Mack wrote:
> Second, I was wondering if there exists any documentation or
> specifications on standard GNOME UI practices. This includes widget use
> conventions, layout practices, and overall user interaction.

A lot of us have been thinking that this needs to be done yesterday,
but for one reason or another we still have nothing to show for it.


> If no such document exists, I would like to begin a project to produce
> one. In addition, I would like to organize a group to help authors apply
> these standards to their applications when the specifications mature
> adequately.

I say, go for it. Arlo Rose of Eazel has sort of claimed this role,
but nothing's been produced so far so I think you have a green light
to go ahead and make your own attempt at this.

I was thinking about this issue some months ago and I came up with a
very rough outline of what a document should look like (modelled
loosely on the Mac and KDE UI guidelines documents). As usual, my time
quickly got eaten up by university so I didn't get any further. Here's
what I came up with though:

- Concepts
    - Metaphor
    - Consistency
    - Direct manipulation
    - Aesthetics
    - Newbie vs. Techie
    (Note: The Mac UI has a guiding set of concepts described in its
    guidelines. I'm not sure whether the somewhat haphazard evolution
    of the Gnome system could allow for such a thing, nor whether it
    could be retrofitted onto the current system.)
- Window Management
    - MDI, SDI, etc.
    - Tabbed docs vs. separate windows
    - Sizing and placement
    - Use of borders
- Widgets
    - Appropriate widget usage
- Standard ui elements
    - Menu bar
        - Items, order...
    - Toolbars
        - Relationship to menu bars
    - Dialog boxes
        - General principles
        - Alerts, modal, modeless, etc.
        - Standard Gnome dialogs
    - Preferences
    - Splash screens?
- Keybindings
    - Defaults
    - Keyboard navigation
- User settings
    - Respect GTK+ themes
    - Don't hard-code fonts, colours, etc.
- Internationalisation/Localisation
- Accessibility
- Drag and drop
- Clipboard/Selection
- Wording, capitalisation, etc.
    - Case sensitivity in filesystem
	
Other issues:
- Role of the desktop
- Web integration


I think my approach to something like this would be to start small.
I'd probably start by considering something like menu structure or the
button positioning on dialogs before I started to tackle windowing
modes and the like.

colin

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