Re: [Usability] Ellipsis on buttons

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On Thu, 23 Mar 2006, Calum Benson wrote:

> Date: Thu, 23 Mar 2006 11:56:56 +0000
> From: Calum Benson <Calum Benson Sun COM>
> To: Joachim Noreiko <jnoreiko yahoo com>
> Cc: Gnome usability <usability gnome org>,
>      GNOME Documentation <gnome-doc-list gnome org>
> Subject: Re: [Usability] Ellipsis on buttons
>
>
> On 23 Mar 2006, at 09:26, Joachim Noreiko wrote:
>
> > How do I describe a button that only says '...' ?

You describe it as a bug which must be fixed.

> > Eg, in the Keyboard prefs, Layouts tab.
>
> Probably "Browse" or "Open" depending on the context.  It would be
> interesting to know what the accessible description of those buttons
> are, as that's what will be read out by a screenreader.  (If they
> don't have a proper one, that's a bug.)

Buttons should be labelled.

Developers should be slapped for not properly labelling things.
(Reading documentation to find out what things do should be an option not
a necessity.)

There is no really no excuse, dialogs all need to be able to reflow and
resize with different font sizes and themes.  Localisation needs to be
done anyway and there really isn't any point cutting corners by not
labelling buttons.

> > Ccing to the usability list -- does the HIG say
> > anything about this? Should it?
>
> Yes, it should probably say "don't have buttons without proper labels
> on them" :)

I think having a stock label for "Browse..." might help
encourage developers not to cut corners
http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=158009

- Alan H.