Re: System Settings Overview Design

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt postinbox com>]

Allan Day wrote on 26/10/11 07:58:
>
> On Mon, Oct 24, 2011 at 5:31 PM, Allan Day <allanpday gmail com> wrote:
>>
>> On Mon, Oct 24, 2011 at 3:23 PM, Bastien Nocera <hadess hadess net> wrote:
>...
>>> The plan would be to hide hardware based panels where the hardware
>>> isn't readily available. For example, we would hide the Wacom panel
>>> if no Wacom tablets were plugged in and none were configured via
>>> Bluetooth.

When a keyboard or mouse is not working, the reason might be that it has
become unplugged. Or that it is a Bluetooth device that is not yet (or
no longer) paired.

These situations can be explained -- and in the Bluetooth case, fixed --
in the relevant settings panel, if it is always present. They can't be
if the panel is hidden because of the very problem you're trying to solve.

>...
> 
> It's the dynamic content in combination with grouping that's the real
> killer for the layout. I've been thinking about this, and I've started
> to wonder whether the groups are really that helpful. I know I don't
> find them very useful, and I'd be surprised if other people do. They
> can also be misleading.

As with books in a library, categorization of settings is both hard and
necessary.

No matter how well settings are grouped into individual panels, there
will always be similar settings in different panels. For example,
keyboard layout <-> keyboard <-> typing accessibility. Or background
picture <-> screensaver (when it returns) <-> screen locking <-> other
security settings.

Cross-references (like the "Layout Settings" link in Keyboard settings)
can help this to some extent, but inevitably they aren't as good as
cross-references and categories combined.

> I've done a mockup for a group-less settings overview [1], and it
> seems like a big improvement. The regular layout seems to help with
> spatial memory, and the larger icons make identification much easier.
> It also looks nicer.

It also puts Background, Displays, and Screen settings almost as far
apart from each other as they can get. Similarly with Mouse & Touchpad
and Wacom Tablet (if it was present).

> It's worth noting that though grouping is used in some implementations
> (including OS X) it isn't universal. WebOS doesn't use it. Neither did
> GNOME Back in the Day [2].

Both Windows and OS X offer a View menu choice between grouping panels
by category (the default) and as an alphabetical list. So if you know
the name of a panel (e.g. you're following written instructions), but
you're having trouble finding it, you can switch to an alphabetical list
as a last resort. (The same View menu in OS X also offers the
alphabetical list directly as menu items.)

The original problem, of lack of vertical space, can be fixed by
improving the spacing and the font size. The Windows and OS X
equivalents both have much less space around items in the overview
screen, and both use a smaller font for labelling individual panels than
for labelling categories.

-- 
mpt