Re: [Usability] Text for select pattern dialog

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt myrealbox com>]

On Jul 8, 2006, at 10:53 PM, Joachim Noreiko wrote:
> Bug 301690 requests a line of description text in Nautilus's Select 
> pattern dialog.

While you're there, maybe you could fix a few other problems? :-)
*   The menu item should end with an ellipsis, because the usual
    intended task (selecting some items) requires more input.
*   "Select Pattern" is unhelpful. It's not for selecting a pattern,
    it's for selecting items that match a pattern. Perhaps "Select
    Items Matching…"
*   The gap between the "Pattern:" label and the field should be 6px.
    (It looks as though the label is centered when it should be
    right-aligned.)
*   The keyboard equivalents for Cancel and OK should be Escape and
    Enter, not C and O.

> I'd appreciate suggestions from the usability list, as I am having 
> trouble thinking of something suitable.
>
> "Enter a pattern to select files with." With? or 'by'? Seems all 
> backwards.
>
> "Enter a pattern and Nautilus will select files that
> match it"
> ...
> "Select files whose names match this pattern:"

The problem with all of these, I think, is that they're not helpful -- 
if you don't know what a "pattern" is and you open this dialog to 
investigate, none of those sentences are going to leave you any the 
wiser. And the phrase "Enter a" is redundant with the visibility of the 
text field, so you should avoid it if practical.

Instead, I suggest adding a couple of useful examples underneath the 
field. This would simultaneously help explain how the field works, and 
provide a first lesson in entering regexp patterns.

Something like this ...
 ______________________________________________________
|:::::::::::::::::::: Select Items ::::::::::::::::::::|
|                    ________________________________  |
| Matching pattern: [________________________________] |
|                                                      |
|         Examples: untitled* (begins with "untitled") |
|                   *\~ (ends with "~")                |
|                                                      |
| ( Help )                     ( Cancel ) (( Select )) |
|______________________________________________________|

> ... and also changing the OK button to read "Select"?

Yes.

Having said all that, this entire dialog seems like it *should* be 
redundant with the search function. (That is, selecting items at the 
top level of the current listing, based on a regexp, should be 
something you can do easily in the search interface.)

Cheers
--
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/