[Usability]Re: [gnome-love] GNOME Human Interface Guidelines 1.0 released

[Rodd Clarkson <rodd redfishbluefish com au>]

On Wed, 2002-08-21 at 15:31, Seth Nickell wrote:
> The Human Interface Guidelines may be browsed online or downloaded from:
> 
>     http://usability.gnome.org/hig

This is fantastic.  Great to see.

> Further, we would like to challenge the KDE project to serve the general
> user community by partnering with us in developing these guidelines to
> create a common Free Software interface style. Most users avail of a mix
> of applications from both desktops and other sources, whatever their
> particular choice of environment. Everyone wins when we make this
> natural and convenient. We call on the members of the KDE project to
> rise above Not Invented Here (a natural tendency that few people, much
> less large projects, successfully repress, we know) in taking a major
> step for the good of both our user bases and the long term success of
> Free Software.

While I applaud what is being said in this paragraph above it does come
over as a little antagonistic (and I'm a Gnome user ;-] )

Could I suggest that before this letter is sent to any KDE related list
that some of the wording be changed.  We are after all wanting to see
cooperation between KDE and Gnome, and it might be good to keep things
'pleasant' from the start.

Could I suggest that the paragraph above be worded as follows:

Further, we would like to invite the KDE community, along with other
developers, to partner with the Gnome community for the benefit of all
desktop users in developing and using these guidelines to create a
common Free Software interface style. Many users avail themselves of a
mix of applications from both desktops and other sources regardless of
the environment choices. By working together everyone wins by creating a
consistent usability experience across Linux. We call on all developers,
Gnome, KDE or otherwise, to work towards this goal for the good of all
our user bases and the long term success of Free Software.

I'm happy if people would like to change this further, but I do feel
that the current paragraph was a little 'in-your-face!'

regards

Rodd Clarkson
(Running off to print and read the HIG 8^])

-- 
Redfish Bluefish [Creative]
Phone : 03 9879 5944
Fax   : 03 9879 5833

"I mean heck, it's even got a graphical configurator, so you don't 
 have to use the command line to hose your system anymore."

				-- George (Gnome Developer)