Re: [HIG] Error in menu section - Closing SDI

[Calum Benson <calum benson sun com>]

On Wed, 2002-07-03 at 09:46, Gregory Merchan wrote:

> Unfortunately, I don't recall the discussion of this; maybe someone will take
> the time to research the mailing list archive. I'm fairly sure this was
> supposed to be "in the case of an multiple-document interface".

Yep, I believe you're right.  Fixing now.

> Perhaps an appropriate response to WM_DELETE_WINDOW for MDI should also be
> stated in the HIG. The response I've seen is like this example from Galeon:
> 
>   +-----------------------------------------------------+
>   |  .    There are multiple tabs open in this window.  |
>   | /!\   Are you sure you want to close it?            |
>   | --------------------------------------------------- |
>   |           [[ Close Window ]] [ Don't Close Window ] |
>   +-----------------------------------------------------+
> 
> This is from galeon 1.2.5, hence the button order. (I presume.)

This is certainly a bit silly, I'd at least expect the labels to be
"Cancel" and "Close Window" under our current proposals.  The guidelines
should probably be more specific about this, I've seen one or two
message boxes creeping in recently with an ugly "Don't (do something)"
on the buttons where "Cancel" would be more appropriate.

> Having to name in the interface the controls of the interface I take
> as a sign that something is wrong. Here we see tabs, windows, and
> warnings explicit.

That's a good point.  In the case of Galeon at least, I guess it would
probably be more appropriate to talk about "pages" or somesuch, rather
than tabs.  (This doesn't address the use of "window" of course).

> The question "Are you sure?" is probably never the correct question.
> I'm not sure this has been elaborated elsewhere, but I'll assume it
> has been for now.

Actually I don't think we've ever really discussed this at much length,
sounds like another candidate for a guideline.

> The dreaded "Quit bugging me" checkbox.

I've had this on my list for a while to talk about in the HIG too. 
Although actually I'm amazed that GNOME 2.0 has so few of them-- so much
so that when I do see one it really stands out as being unpleasant. 
Maybe people are slowly learning after all...

> On to the proposal. If MDI are to persist and if closing the toplevel window
> of an MDI is to present an alert, then I propose that the primary action
> of the alert be to close the foremost document, the alert have the standard
> cancel button, and that closing all documents and the window be a secondary
> action. The buttons would perhaps be:
> 
> |     [ Close All ] [ Cancel ] [ Close Tab ] |

Certainly agree that Cancel should be one of the options.  I'd maybe
need some more convincing that Close All and Close Tab are the right way
around though-- or perhaps they're the right way around, but "Close All"
should be the default button?  I can imagine expert users who understand
MDI getting annoyed if Close Tab was the default when they'd explicitly
ask to close the whole window. (Well, I certainly would anyway, but
maybe I'm in a minority of one...)

Cheeri,
Calum.

-- 
CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer       Sun Microsystems Ireland
mailto:calum benson ireland sun com    Desktop Engineering Group
http://www.sun.ie                      +353 1 819 9771

Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems