Re: [Usability] My second file chooser proposal

[Magnus Bergman <magnusbe algonet se>]

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 15:09:25 -0400
Sean Middleditch <elanthis awesomeplay com> wrote:

> On Mon, 2003-09-15 at 15:15, Magnus Bergman wrote:
> 
> > 3 Works from top to bottom and from left to right.
> > 
> >   A human scans through information in this order, therefore the
> >   widgets should be placed in this order. (See my previous mail for
> >   more details.)
> 
> Minor nitpick - I don't think all humans scan in this order; just
> those of us that use languages that flow in that order.  People whose
> language flow from right to left or bottom to top would, I suspect,
> find it more intuitive for work to flow in those directions as well.

Yes, I'm well aware of this (as I mentioned in my first proposal). I
think this is an important issue which needs to be dealt with, but not
right now I guess. I would be very interesting in discussing this with
someone who uses a right to left locale. For example, if you read from
right to left, do you then consider left to be the direction of forward?
And if so do you consider the right symbol for skipping to the next song
in a media player to be an arrow pointing left? Or is the western
influence to big for these things to matter? (And in that case maybe
that is a problem in itself?)

I've also heard theories about that the fact that most people are right
handed has something to do with it. Maybe a right to left placement of
things is would be more intuitive to left handed people if it wasn't for
the cultural influences? I know some left handed people who used to have
the mouse on the left side of the keyboard and have the buttons swapped.
But they have now changed that back (even on their own computers)
because they were more or less forced getting used to how things
normally are.

> I'm not personally aware of any languages that flow bottom to top, but
> there are plenty that go right to left.  If a dialog only works well
> in left-to-right scenarios, it could be less than ideal.

I agree. But that is already the case with all the dialogs in gnome. The
first step should be to make the appropriate changes to the HIG. I don't
know if some thought has been put into this by the core team. Maybe a
bug should be filed? But before I do anything, I will try to get in
contact with at least one person who uses a right to left locale.

> I'm no human computer interaction expert, tho.  Just relying on
> oft-failed common sense here.  ;-)

I'm no expert either, neither do I have common sense (seriously,
it's a neurological dysfunction). But that doesn't stop me =)