Re: [Usability] Save As mockup (Was RFP: File chooser user interface)

[Alan Horkan <horkana maths tcd ie>]

On 12 Sep 2003, Dave Malcolm wrote:

> On Mon, 2003-09-08 at 14:27, Owen Taylor wrote:
> > GtkFileChooser is the next generation file selection widget for GTK+
> > that will appear in GTK+-2.4. Quite a bit of work has been done on the
> > application programming interfaces and on the internal implementation,
> > but there is, as yet, no firm design for how the file selector should
> > look and work.
> >
> > This is a request for proposals for how the file selection user
> > interface; what we are hoping to do is to get a number of user
> > interface proposals, pick one or combine elements from multiple
> > proposals, implement a first draft, and then refine from there.
> >
>
> I've created some mockups of a "Save As..." dialog.
>
> Users of Mac OS X (and, potentially, lawyers at Apple) may notice a
> strong similarity between the proposal and the standard Aqua dialog.

Links to screenshots of the Mac OS X dialogs
(if someone has better screenshots from previous discussions please post
them)

http://infotech.cas.msu.edu/osxinlabs/media/savedialogstandard.gif
http://infotech.cas.msu.edu/osxinlabs/media/savedialogextended.gif

One of the flaws that people have metioned in particular about the Mac OS
X file dialog is that the list columns are quite narrow and forces you to
scroll sideways which is fairly unpleasant.

> You can see the basic form of my "Save As..." dialog proposal here:
> http://www.davemalcolm.demon.co.uk/mockups/screenshot-save-as-basic.png

The sheer simplicity of it is admirable particularly if the program has
put you in the place where you want to be and suggested a good filename,
but I think balancing it with the users who will want a far more
complicated is difficult.

It is definately an interesting approach, especially considering the wide
range of platforms and hardware that GTK runs on (think GPE) and that
developers will inevitably want to make changes and extensions a
really simple default is probably a good place to start from.

Sincerely

Alan Horkan
http://advogato.org/person/AlanHorkan/

[GPE  http://gpe.handhelds.org/ ]