Re: [Usability][De]Select All and Select menus

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On 28 Jan 2003, Lars Clausen wrote:

> Date: 28 Jan 2003 13:00:23 -0600
> From: Lars Clausen <lrclause cs uiuc edu>
> To: usability gnome org
> Subject: [Usability][De]Select All and Select menus

> Just got a bug report for Dia
> <URL:http://www.lysator.liu.se/~alla/dia/dia.html> today about the
> placement of the [De]Select All menu items, which according to the HIG
> should be in the Edit menu.  Now Dia has a number of other ways to select
> or deselect objects, and we have a separate Select menu with those.  The
> HIG doesn't mention what should be done with further selection entries --
> if we move them all to the Edit menu, it becomes too large.  I see that
> Gimp also has a separate Select menu, but I guess it's not HIG compliant
> yet.  What would be the preferred setup when there's many selection menu
> items?

The reason i never mentioned this as a problem Lars is because it really
is not a problem.

The Human Interface Guidlines are flexible.

Duplicate menu items are generally to be avoided but if people really are
confused it might be worth having a Select All menu item under Edit.

If Ctrl+A worked for Select All i suspect less people would notice where
we in the menus we put it.

I think complexity is a good enough excuse in this situation.  If Dia did
not already have such deep menus i might suggest having a Select submenu
under Edit.  This would not be very nice for users who are doing
everything via right click (rather than using Dia with a Menu bar docked
into the document window).

/me resists temptation to say rude things about the Gimp user interface.
oh hell:
it aint called Gimp for nothing

Later
Alan H.

PS Lars knows me already from the dia mailing list in case anyone is
wondering.

PPS Anyone want to hear me criticize Jakob Neilsen?  (i mostly agree with
him but it is fun when experts are wrong and i spotted a real clanger in
his book).