Re: [Setup-tool-hackers] xst

[Luis Villa <louie ximian com>]

On Thu, 2001-09-20 at 12:05, Chema Celorio wrote:
> On 20 Sep 2001 00:28:54 -0400, Luis Villa wrote:
> > On Thu, 2001-09-20 at 00:06, Chema Celorio wrote:
> > > On 19 Sep 2001 16:31:15 -0400, Mitch Allmond wrote:
> > > > sounds cool. One other thing that concerns me is the dialog boxes in the new
> > > > gnomecc. There really should be a option on the main gnomecc window that allows
> > > > things to open up in dialogs or in the main window. To some "me" the dialogs are
> > > > very annoying.
> > > 
> > > One of our tasks is to define policy on how things should work. The
> > > general consensus was that capplet embeding was really bad from a user
> > > interfeace point of view. We decided to not embed capplets anymore. I am
> > > sorry, but I believe the capplets will not be embedable again, not even
> > > as a configruation option. It is hard to please everyone.
> > 
> > Putting on my UI hat for a bit... options are our friends. Generally
> 
> I think options *can* be our UI enemies. Look at the sawfish or the
> pannel capplets.

That is the fault of those capplet's complete failure to make even the
smallest attempt at organizing the options they present, not because
they offer too many options. Nautilus has the right solution to this-
make everything customizable, but hide most of the options unless you
specifically choose to see them. Making it impossible to make your own
choices for no good reason* other than 'we know better' is not the right
way to go.

Luis

*Obviously, as we've discussed here, there are good code reasons to not
offer the option this discussion sprang from.

P.S. 'OS X doesn't offer these things' is hardly a good argument. Even
the most ardent mac fanatics dislike mac's recent UI work- google for
'interface hall of shame' sometime. 


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