Re: [Usability] inability to experiment

[Shaun McCance <shaunm gnome org>]

On Wed, 2008-05-28 at 13:51 +0100, David Dolphin wrote:
> 2008/5/28 Calum Benson <Calum Benson sun com>:
> > It's also, quite frankly, pretty complex, and way OTT for controlling
> > the sort of changes we're talking about here IMHO.  (I know you were
> > just describing it, rather than suggesting it, though!)
> 
> I think what I was trying to say was that modifier keys are a nice way
> to add extra functionality to dialog box options. You may only use the
> extra functionality 5% of the time, and so the functions don't require
> their own buttons (as they would lead to an overly intrusive UI), but
> when you need them they are important.

I think the fact that Photoshop is a pro tool with a long
learning curve is nonetheless important.  People who use
Photoshop for professional work will, in turn, learn how
to make efficient use of modifier keys.  They're not very
discoverable, so their utility is limited to people who
invest the time to read documentation or take classes.

For standard preferences windows, I very much doubt many
people would ever learn this.  And it's not even the case
that it would tend to be learned by the people it would
help the most.  Something like "Reset to Defaults" would
probably be most useful to an inexperienced user who has
tinkered around and can't figure out how to get things
back the way they were.

--
Shaun