Re: GnuCash page on GO site

[linas linas org (Linas Vepstas)]

On Thu, Feb 26, 2004 at 05:06:06PM +0000, Calum Benson was heard to remark:
> On Thu, 2004-02-26 at 16:44, Linas Vepstas wrote:
> > On Thu, Feb 26, 2004 at 01:00
> 
> > Well, no. The icon/progress indicator is much too small. You have to 
> > focus your eyes to see it (literally).  You can't just stand at the 
> > other end of the room, glance at the screen and get the status;
> > you have to push your nose to the glass and focus and look for the 
> > icons/progress bars.
> 
> Right, that's why it's supposed to be a redundant mechanism.  If you
> have trouble with your eyesight (as you presumably have, if you've
> selected a 'use only theme colours' preference), you're unlikely to be
> looking at something from the other side of a room :)  And if you don't
> have trouble with your eyesight, then sure, by all means stick with
> whatever colours/flashing the app makes available.

I'm frustrated with this conversation. This has nothing to do with
bad eyesight.  What I'm trying to say is that if you are busy, 
you like to have a visually straight-forward way of monitoring the
status of something from across the room.  Icons/progress bars
is simply too small, visually too small, to provide that interface.

Human eye saccadic movements take time. Focusing the eye takes
time, even for the person with te best eyesight in the world. 
A colored background display can provide an important visual
report of status, even if its from the corner of your eye, even
if its while you are jogging past your monitor.  

Themeability also has damned little to do with it.  The 
internationally accepted colors for go/caution/stop are 
green/yellow/red.  If you want, create a theme with lime
green and ale red, but good lord don't exchange red for green.

My complaint was simply that the current gtk ctree widget 
does not allow different rows to be set to different colors.
I want these to be set to different colors.  I want those colors
to be none/go/caution/stop. 

--linas

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