Re: [libreoffice-design] Proposition to combine the Apply/Reset buttons

Hi all
On Tue, 2011-04-19 at 22:49 +0200, RGB ES wrote: 

> 2011/4/19 Christoph Noack <christoph@dogmatux.com>:
> > Hi Heinzs, hi Ricardo, hi Jay!
> >
> > First, I have to agree that the animation was excellent - it's great to
> > see how you "packaged" the idea. How did you make that (some time ago, I
> > used Gimp to create animations but it was a tedious task...)?
> >
> > Now to the more detailed stuff ...
> >
> > Am Dienstag, den 19.04.2011, 21:11 +0200 schrieb RGB ES:
> > > 2011/4/19 planas <jslozier@gmail.com>:
> > > > On Tue, 2011-04-19 at 14:56 +0200, Sparkling Specks wrote:
> > ...
> > > > > In the upcoming 3.4 release there will be an additional button in
> > > > > dialogs, "Apply," to apply changes made in dialogues without closing
> > > > > the dialogue. This new button means that now there are five or six
> > > > > buttons on the bottom of many properties dialogs, "OK," "Apply,"
> > > > > "Cancel," "Reset," ("Default"), "Help."
> >
> > Totally agreed, this is a bit too much.
> >
> > > > > In an attempt to cut that number down again, I want to propose
> > > > > combining the Apply and Reset buttons. There's a bug about that here:
> > > > > https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=36112 , an animation to
> > > > > show the feature (
> > > > > https://bugs.freedesktop.org/attachment.cgi?id=45456 ) is attached to
> > > > > the bug -- please excuse its amateurish execution.
> >
> > > > My only concern is that many users would not carefully read the button
> > > > labels and not realize the function has changed.
> > >
> > > Agree. Sadly there is not an easy solution for this. A possibility
> > > would be to "merge" buttons (normal click to accept, long click to
> > > apply, or add a "menu" to accept button, so if you click on it you
> > > accept, but with long click a menu opens), but this will only change
> > > clutter with complexity...
> >
> > Mmh, I'm currently a bit worried that even Format "Paragraph Style" is
> > different from Format "Paragraph" ... however, in the current version we
> > end up with:
> >
> >        OK Apply Cancel Help Reset Standard
> >
> > Both Reset and Standard are somehow tied to the styles and have to be
> > kept - but, especially Reset (=Revert) fits nicely to a different kind
> > of dialog.
> >
> > Let's assume that any change within this dialog applies the changes
> > immediately (reasonable with regard to today's computational power). The
> > dialog itself would be non-modal - and each of the changes has to be put
> > into the undo stack. Then we can change the buttons and their behavior
> > to:
> >
> >        Close Revert Help Standard
> >
> > Close = Closes the dialog (the changes have already been applied)
> > Revert = Reverts the changes since the dialog was opened (a bit
> > different to the original reset that resets all changes on the current
> > tab page)
> > Standard = same behavior as before
> >
> > If we would (consistently!) apply rules on Mac OS X or Gnome, then we
> > might shift the Help button to improve the structure to:
> >
> >        Help        Close Revert Standard
> >
> > The "normal" paragraph dialog may be changed to:
> >
> >        Help        Close Revert
> >
> > How does that sound? Even if we stick with the today's position of
> > "Help", I think it would be an improvement.
> >
> > It would be great to have a generic specification for that, so we can
> > address the developers of all the modules to change the behavior. Anyone
> > interested in picking this up? Would be excellent and incredibly helpful
> > - I'm currently unable to work on that. Thanks!
> >
> > Cheers,
> > Christoph
> >
> >
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> What about this crazy idea?: reset the style to former status is an
> "administrative task", so let's put the Standard button *only on the
> Organizer tab*, for example just below the "Contains".
> After all you should not need to use the "Standard" button so often:
> it needs to be available, but not in front of you all the time...
> What do you think?
> Cheers,
> Ricardo
>
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I like the idea of standard location with an offset of the help button
on the dialog boxes. If it is consistent users will find it easier, my
motto is anything to make a user's life easier is better. I do not have
a particular location preference, left side or right side just that we
are consistent in its location. We might want to define as an offset
from the nearest side, 0.20 cm (number not important, just we use the
same offset).

I having trouble visualizing the how the buttons would work, it sounds
like the revert button is an undo button, the close button is an ok
(accept all changes and shut up button), and I think a cancel button
might be needed (forget about the changes, take me back to where I was
in the document). I know sometimes I will open a dialog box like the
example and as I making changes realize I am doing the wrong actions and
want exit without any changes.
-- 
Jay Lozier
Jslozier@gmail.com

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