Re: [GnomeMeeting-list] I want my users advice

[Christian Rose <menthos menthos com>]

lör 2002-02-02 klockan 03.11 skrev OverrideX:
> I don't consider 5 or 6 buttons exactly being a lot of buttons for an
> app

True, it isn't.


> and gnomemeeting isn't a normal app where the whole thing resizes
> as the video is static

True.


> making the most of the space with a simple
> vertical toolbar just seems the right thing to do

...why? Just because the application isn't wide doesn't mean it can't
use regular horizontal toolbars. As you point out, GnomeMeeting has few
icons, so there should not be any magic needed to make them fit.


> making an app work
> like everything else isn't always the way to go, it depends on the app,
> and having an unconventional setup isn't exactly a bad thing

Yes it is. An unconventional setup is always a bad thing, since it
requires re-learning. This is a fundamental principle, I don't know how
you can dispute that.


> look at the gimp, it's one of if not the most popular and powerful apps out
> there, and it's interface is anything but conventional using right click
> for mostly everything and having a separate toolbox window full of
> buttons, but it works well, and it's a good setup for that app's needs.

Excuse me? The GIMP is a wonderful tool for those who have learned to
master it, but it also happens to be a well-known usability nightmare
because of serious interface mistakes, which makes learning it very
painful for many people.
It hides almost everything under right-click context menus and abuses
the context menu principle that way. There are several problems with
this, among them that many very essential functions (like file saving
and opening) are completely hidden and non-visible from the interface,
and also that it hides functions that are not context-based in these
context menus. Context menus are for viewing the properties of an object
and modifying the object, but how on earth is quitting the application a
modification of the image object?

So I'm quite amused that you bring up the GIMP as a usability example.
What will you bring up next? VMS?


> Screen space is important to people

Yeah, but also to most people it is second-hand to usability.


> and having another horizontal
> toolbar is just going to make it taller and bigger, while having a
> solution already implemented that fits gnomemeeting's needs, keeping it
> compact and just as functional.

The problem is that it doesn't fit most users' needs. Most users don't
need yet another toolbar type.


Christian