Subject: 0.9.3 blocker -- more close vs. exit testing needed
From: Paul Rohr (paul@abisource.com)
Date: Sat Sep 01 2001 - 12:55:53 CDT
Hi folks,
I just rebuilt and tried out the new implementation of the "don't close on
exit" feature.
While I think the general spirit of the current approach is admirable --
thanks, Dom! -- I'm afraid it needs a bit more tweaking before we let it out
the door. This is a such a fundamental change to AbiWord's look and feel
that we don't want *any* unpleasant surprises when we release 0.9.3.
Two specific issues:
1. avoid it
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I consider the availability of a working "do it like you did before" setting
on all platform's preference dialogs to be a MUST for any 0.9.3 binary we
release. (I know this is on Dom's TODO list, and there ought to be enough
time for other platform maintainers to do their matching implementations,
but I don't know whether they've set aside the time yet.)
We have well over a hundred thousand existing users, most of whom have
gotten quite used to the old behavior, and forcing them to edit their
preference files by hand to keep working like they used to seems rude.
A quicker alternative would be to swap the default preference setting to
continue to Just Work the old way, but I doubt that would make the noisy
advocates of the new behavior too happy. ;-)
2. test it
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Since our current belief is that most people will prefer the new "don't exit
on close" behavior, we need to make sure that it Just Works, too. Until we
get to that point, I'd encourage all developers to use AbiWord in that mode.
If we're not willing to eat our own dog food here, we shouldn't foist it
off on our users.
Specifically, I'd like to *strongly* encourage the many many advocates of
this new behavior to build a CVS version and test it thoroughly NOW to make
sure the implementation feels flawless to you, too. Lots of emails and
abstract ideas are no substitute for seeing how the user experience actually
feels in real life.
For example, I just checked in a fix for one glitch that I'm shocked that
nobody complained about:
http://www.abisource.com/mailinglists/abiword-dev/01/September/0025.html
Also, I'm still not thrilled with the net effect when you close an existing,
untitled, empty document. What do *you* think should happen in this case?
(I think we should definitely exit, but perhaps that's my "die, die" bias.)
Currently, all that happens is the document number gets bumped up by one,
which is very very weird.
I'm afraid that there may be more such glitches, and we should definitely
iron them out so the feature, as a whole, really does Just Work.
bottom line
-----------
For 0.9.3, if we're going to feature the new behavior (by making it the
default), we need to do both of the following:
- test enough to make sure it Just Works
- provide an easy way to revert to the prior behavior
If both can't be done in an acceptable timeframe, then let's switch the
default preference to hide the feature. That way, folks from the "keep it
open" camp can get 0.9.3 binaries, edit their prefs files by hand to enable
the new behavior, and do the necessary testing then.
Does that make sense?
Paul
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