Re: [Usability] Consistency 1: more Stock items, Discard for example.

[Leonardo Santagada <santagada gmail com>]

I had this idea that is so simple that maybe someone already did it,
that is to make a lot of sample .glade files showing recomended
designs for hig compliant apps. This is easy to do, can be done now
(without touching a line of code), would not force things down gtk and
glade developer throats. Then you could do a SaveConfirmAlert in one
of those .glade files.


On Thu, 23 Dec 2004 03:30:42 +0000 (GMT), Alan Horkan
<horkana maths tcd ie> wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, Seth Nickell wrote:
> 
> > Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2004 17:46:32 -0800
> > From: Seth Nickell <snickell gmail com>
> > Reply-To: seth gnome org
> > To: Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>
> > Cc: usability gnome org
> > Subject: Re: [Usability] Consistency 1: more Stock items,
> >      Discard for example.
> >
> > http://usability.gnome.org/hig/2.0/windows-alert.html#save-confirmation-alerts
> >
> > I continue to claim that the best way to get widespread interface
> > consistency is to make it the easiest way to go.
> 
> Agreed.  Particular I would hope that Glade and other Rapid Application
> Tools could make it difficult (but not impossible) to create a non-HIG
> interface unless you deliberately set out to do so.
> 
> Part of the reason I brought up this issue is because there are other many
> other things (like "View, Status Bar" for example, something specified in
> the HIG but doesn't seem to have a stock item yet) that are so common that
> stock menu items would probably be a good idea and I'd very much
> appreciate advice on how to go about adding them or figure out how to get
> someone else to add them.
> 
> > Jody chose to ignore HIG here,
> 
> I think it is a little harsh to say that not following the exact button
> labels in this case was deliberate ignoring the HIG and given that I
> mentioned quite a few other programs it is little unfair to single out
> Jody.  The HIG after all is not Gospel it is just guidelines (and I
> wouldn't even assume Jody necessarily added the dialog either as such a
> basic bit of functionality has probably been there for years).
> 
> I think the more verbose labelling was worth a try but it really doesn't
> work for me, and I much prefer a single word "Discard", but irregardless
> of that if there had been a GTK_STOCK_DISCARD and developers had been
> encouraged to use it the label would need only be changed in one place
> (and although I wouldn't recompile all of GTK to change one label to how I
> want i might just do for a whole set of labels, a filechooser, and one or
> two other widgets I'd rather not argue about).
> 
> > but I suspect if there was a GtkSaveConfirmationAlert he would have just
> > used it.
> 
> That I dont doubt.
> 
> As for a GtkSaveConfirmationAlert I wonder how that would work with
> applications like the GIMP which provide a more advanced Save Confirmation
> Alert if there are multiple unsaved files (and even their ordinary save
> confirmation dialog has a custom timer telling you how long it has been
> since the document was last saved).
> 
> > However, Owen and others do not want to push policy with
> > technical decisions in GTK+. *shrug*
> 
> I would hope that some tasks would crop up often enough that it would be a
> technical decision to add it to GTK and provide a clean API so that others
> could argue over the policy and figure out what widgets and the labels to
> use and other implementation details later (and I'll continue that idea
> when after christmas I follow-up with the rest of the ideas I had to split
> out into 'Consistencey 2').
> 
> Sincerely
> 
> Alan Horkan
> 
> Alan's Journal http://advogato.org/person/AlanHorkan/
> Inkscape, Draw Freely  http://inkscape.org
> Abiword is Awesome http://abisource.com
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Usability mailing list
> Usability gnome org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/usability
> 


-- 
Leonardo Santagada

"But hey, the fact that I have better taste than anybody else in the
universe is just something I have to live with. It's not easy being
me."
-- Linus Torvalds.