From: Christian Neumair (chris_at_gnome-de.org)
Date: Thu Apr 08 2004 - 07:48:01 EDT
Since I'm currently redesigning the UNIX Preferences dialog, I've come
across various preferences that can in my opinion be removed for all
platforms. Comments/discussion is appreciated.
First of all, here is the contents of the enum describing the prefs
accessible through the Preferences dialogs:
id_CHECK_SPELL_CHECK_AS_TYPE
id_CHECK_SPELL_HIDE_ERRORS
id_CHECK_SPELL_SUGGEST
id_CHECK_SPELL_MAIN_ONLY
id_CHECK_SPELL_UPPERCASE
id_CHECK_SPELL_NUMBERS
id_CHECK_SPELL_INTERNET
id_BUTTON_SPELL_AUTOREPLACE
id_CHECK_SMART_QUOTES_ENABLE
id_CHECK_OTHER_DEFAULT_DIRECTION_RTL
id_CHECK_OTHER_USE_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
id_CHECK_OTHER_SAVE_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
id_CHECK_OTHER_HEBREW_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
id_CHECK_AUTO_SAVE_FILE
id_TEXT_AUTO_SAVE_FILE_EXT
id_TEXT_AUTO_SAVE_FILE_PERIOD
id_TEXT_AUTO_SAVE_FILE_PERIOD_SPIN
id_CHECK_PREFS_AUTO_SAVE
id_COMBO_PREFS_SCHEME
id_CHECK_VIEW_SHOW_RULER
id_LIST_VIEW_RULER_UNITS
id_CHECK_VIEW_CURSOR_BLINK
id_CHECK_VIEW_SHOW_STATUS_BAR
id_CHECK_VIEW_ALL
id_CHECK_VIEW_HIDDEN_TEXT
id_CHECK_VIEW_UNPRINTABLE
id_CHECK_COLOR_FOR_TRANSPARENT_IS_WHITE
id_PUSH_CHOOSE_COLOR_FOR_TRANSPARENT
id_BUTTON_SAVE
id_BUTTON_DEFAULTS
id_BUTTON_OK
id_BUTTON_CANCEL
id_BUTTON_APPLY
id_SHOWSPLASH
id_UNIXFONTWARNING
id_CHECK_ALLOW_CUSTOM_TOOLBARS
id_CHECK_ENABLE_SMOOTH_SCROLLING
id_CHECK_AUTO_LOAD_PLUGINS
id_LIST_VIEW_TOOLBARS
id_NOTEBOOK
id_CHECK_LANG_WITH_KEYBOARD
id_CHECK_DIR_MARKER_AFTER_CLOSING_PARENTHESIS
id_last
Ugh, that was a long list. While many of them make sense, I doubt that
all are useful. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
id_CHECK_SPELL_CHECK_AS_TYPE
why should we enable spell-check but only do it if the user explicitly
requests it?
id_CHECK_SPELL_HIDE_ERRORS
even more weird. We do spell-checking but don't show errors. Can't we
merge those into one simple enable spellchecking setting?
id_CHECK_SPELL_SUGGEST
Don't suggest corrections? Why? What's the difference between
HIDE_ERRORS and !SPELL_SUGGEST? Does the computer want to tell the user
"Hah, I know the right correction, but I'm not going to tell 'ya!"?
id_CHECK_SPELL_MAIN_ONLY
Why would you want to not use dictionaries apart from the main
dictionary?
id_CHECK_SPELL_INTERNET
Spell-check URLs?! Can't we simply be smart about words starting with
someprotocol://?
I don't know why we have three enum elements:
id_CHECK_OTHER_USE_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
id_CHECK_OTHER_SAVE_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
id_CHECK_OTHER_HEBREW_CONTEXT_GLYPHS
that all refer to context glyphs. Is Hebrew different from other RTL
languages? Can't we merge them all? Using but not saving something is
awkward. But I don't know anything about RTL, so don't nail me on that.
id_COMBO_PREFS_SCHEME
do we really need them? On UNIX we have a non-working implementation at
the moment and I think one scheme per user should be enough. Keeping
around a default profile in each users' profile file seems to be cracky
as well. Can't we store it at a central location and merge it into the
user's profile at run-time?
id_CHECK_VIEW_SHOW_RULER
id_CHECK_VIEW_SHOW_STATUS_BAR
Hide the status bar? Hide the ruler? I mean, is your screen really
*that* small? What do you gain by hiding them?
id_CHECK_VIEW_HIDDEN_TEXT
Why is text hidden? Isn't it weird to have a document that hides text
from the user?
id_CHECK_VIEW_UNPRINTABLE
At least on UNIX, we have a print view. Is this view available on all
platforms? Shouldn't this imply whether we show/hide unprintable
characters?
id_CHECK_VIEW_ALL
What means not viewing all? This options is way to vague. It should
either be renamed to do something more concrete or removed, if it's just
a top-level modifier for _UNPRINTABLE/_HIDDEN_TEXT
id_CHECK_COLOR_FOR_TRANSPARENT_IS_WHITE
id_PUSH_CHOOSE_COLOR_FOR_TRANSPARENT
Can't we merge them? Having a checkbutton and a pushbutton is awkward.
I'd prefer to have a reset button either inside the color selection
widgets or next to the color selection pushbutton.
id_SHOWSPLASH
Branding is nice. Showing a splash as well. Dunno, maybe I'm misguided,
having a GUI for it makes me feel strange, though.
id_UNIXFONTWARNING
Not displaying warnings is evil. Why not remove it?
id_CHECK_ENABLE_SMOOTH_SCROLLING
Is it CPU expensive?
id_CHECK_AUTO_LOAD_PLUGINS
Why shouldn't we load plugins?
Finally, some more options. I couldn't find out what they mean:
id_NOTEBOOK
id_CHECK_LANG_WITH_KEYBOARD
id_CHECK_DIR_MARKER_AFTER_CLOSING_PARENTHESIS
It looks like some of these options have been copied from Word
unquestioningly. Others may have been kept around traditionally.
Anyway, I'd really appreciate heavy discussions on this since from a
usability point of view some of them are really outrageous.
Let the flamebait begin! :)
regs,
Chris
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Thu Apr 08 2004 - 07:49:56 EDT