Re: Native file chooser dialog on Windows

[Cody Russell <bratsche gnome org>]

On Fri, 2009-05-15 at 13:51 -0400, David Cantin wrote:
> I don't known about this, but from an usability point of view, using
> native dialog should help applications users because they can use
> skills they have learned while they were using others applications..
> 
> Those details are always sensibles when using a foreign gui toolkit.
> 
> I will look into what Tim Evans have said.

If you implement a dialog using gtk+ widgets that is laid out like the
native dialog, has the same accelerators, etc.. then users can take
advantage of these skills as you describe and we can use features of gtk
and it will look absolutely natural in the application.

Unless there are major technical reasons why it's not possible (as it
sounds like it was with the print dialog--unfortunate, but makes sense),
I think using gtk+ widgets and dialogs instead of native ones is
preferable.  If the existing gtk dialog is really out of place on Win32,
I would prefer a new dialog implemented (with gtk+ widgets) for that
platform over invoking the native dialog.  That's still not a very ideal
solution though, since it means there are two file selection dialogs in
gtk+ tree to maintain.  But the user experience can be emulated very
well already, so I think degrading the developer's experience for zero
real user experience advantage is something to be avoided as much as
possible.

/ Cody