Re: Gnome style guide

[famrom idecnet com (Guillermo S. Romero / unnamed / Familia Romero)]

>>Hmmm.. Dialogues with words like OK and Cancel really do come
>>from the school of bad User Interface.  Buttons should be labeled
>>with a purpose.
>True, although OK and Cancel are common and generally understood. My 
>point was that the default should be the button which confirms or 
>completes the request rather than the one which cancels it.

So why not do it well the first time? I always liked the Gimp, where you get
Close - Cancel and other sets of buttons that have full meaning, not just
OK. And how do you translate OK to Spanish, for example? "OK" is not a valid
response.

>> What does OK mean?
>It means, like, yeah, sure, whatever.

OK what? OK kill all programs? OK close? Use verbs, not general words. Show
the user that your program is a bit smart, not a machine made product. ;]

>>Better to have a Cancel / Save pair of buttons for example.  Worst 
>>case ever, which is far to common are the Yes/No/Cancel options.  
>>Whats the obvious difference between No and Cancel??
>To use a common example, "Save before exiting? Yes/No/Cancel": Yes 
>means save and exit, No means don't save but exit, and Cancel means 
>don't save or exit. I generally understand Cancel to mean "Pretend I 
>never made the request I just made, and get rid of this dialog without 
>changing anything." However, you can make your button smaller if you 
>just label it Cancel.

I think all this discussion is repeated. Please visit Gnome-GUI archive and
the latest GUI docs in CVS. IIRC the buttons to "Save before exiting?"
should be "Save - Discard - Cancel", for example.

GSR