Re: Flipping for scrolled windows

[Tzafrir Cohen <tzafrir technion ac il>]

On Mon, 24 Sep 2001, Pablo Saratxaga wrote:

> On Mon, Sep 24, 2001 at 10:38:49PM +0200, Tzafrir Cohen wrote:
>
> > I'm not sure that flippping everything is a good idea.
> >
> > This thing is that the user may be exposed to both flipped and unflipped
> > windows, and this means that the user iinterface is inconsistent.
> >
> > Windows98 was the first version of windows to be released in which the
> > Hebrew support included a flipping of the user interface. Many people
> > (including me) avoided installing the "localized" version (and installed
> > the "enabled" version,m which has the original user interface) because the
> > user interface was unfamiliar:
>
> But with Gtk+ 2 you can configure that;

[snipped description of how. No need to remind us that win98 is not very
configurable ;-) ]

> > When I wanted to close a window, I was used to clicking the button in the
> > top-left corner, not necesarily the button above the top of the first menu
> > item.
>
> So, the reason was just because you got accostumed to an interface not
> made for your language.

But what if my desktop has windows of both types?

What if my dekstop is LTR and my friend's desktop is RTL? I will be
confused when trying to work at my friend's computer.

>
> > Considering the user's habits, the geometry should change as least as
> > possible, unless there is a good reason. In the case of everything that
> > involves text, there is a good reason for flipping. But I don't think that
> > this applies to scroll-bars and title-bar buttons.
>
> Well, I think having text in RTL and widgets in LTR *IS* perturbing.

[snipped example of "previous" and "next" buttons]

I agree with your example. However, my comment was about scroll-bars and
title-bar buttons, that have no text.

> As soon as there is only *one word* displayed, or even *one letter* displayed
> on screen, then you have text, and you have a reading direction, either
> LTR or RTL, and I think the whole interface should follows that direction;
> doing otherwise will be mixing and confusing.

My point is that flipping has its overhead in terms of usability, and thus
should be avoided where it is not useful.

-- 
Tzafrir Cohen
mailto:tzafrir technion ac il
http://www.technion.ac.il/~tzafrir