Re: Button ordering

[Gregory Merchan <merchan phys lsu edu>]

On Fri, Nov 02, 2001 at 03:28:04PM -0500, Owen Taylor wrote:
> 
> I've just applied Gregory Merchan's patch in:
> 
>  http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=56331
> 
> To make the GTK+ standard dialogs button ordering conform to the gnome
> usability project's dialog proposal.
> 
>  http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/proposals/dialog.html
> 
> This is Mac style with the "action" button at the lower right
> hand corner, as opposed to what we've done in the past - Windows style
> with the default button at the left.
> 
> So, 
> 
>   [ Help ]                 [ Cancel ] [   OK   ]
> 
> Not:
> 
>   [ Help ]                 [   OK   ] [ Cancel ]
> 
> While I'm willing to be told that this is the better ordering (the
> fact that Windows and Mac disagree probably mean that there is no
> "right" ordering), . . .

All the evidence thusfar indicates that Apple were the ones who actually
looked into this and IBM (followed by Motif and Windows) probably only
did othewise to avoid lawsuits. By the time IBM OS/2 2.1 was released, IBM
had started using the same sequence as Apple but reversed and so placing OK
and similar buttons (e.g., Save and Find) consistenly in the lower _left_
corner; however, it was probably too late for Windows or Motif to change by
that time.

>              . . . I have two reservations about the change:
> 
>  * Familiarity is important; I'm feeling quite disoriented by
>    the change and other of our users will probably be disoriented
>    too, both existing GNOME users and users coming from Windows.

Familiarity for Windows and CDE users is being sacrificed. Mac users and OS/2
users will find the arrangement more familiar. New users will not suffer
from loss of familiarity and will indeed gain from having the correct order

>  * With this change we'll have inconsistency in all apps until
>    they are fixed.

This is unavoidable for many changes. The entire platform is shifting,
this is the time to make the change.

> Anyways, since I'm sure this change is going to cause controversy I
> thought I might as well start the flame war myself to save time ;-)
> 
> Regards,
>                                         Owen

I hope a flame war is not necessary. Please, everyone, read the proposal and
follow the relevant links for more information. No searche has yet yielded
any rationale whatsoever for the Windows arrangement.

Please also note that is an early proposal and some of the items may change
by the release of the interface guidelines for GNOME.

The button order is not expected to be one of these.


Cheers,
Gregory Merchan