Re: [Usability] GNOME UI principle: All applications should saveinternal state?

[Rodney Dawes <dobey free fr>]

On Hën , 2004-04-05 at 19:15 +0400, Andrei Yurkevich wrote:

> On Mon, 2004-04-05 at 02:58, gabor wrote:
> > On Mon, 2004-04-05 at 02:58, Ryan McDougall wrote:
> > > On Mon, 2004-04-05 at 10:31 +0900, janne wrote:
> > > > mГҐn 2004-04-05 klockan 09.33 skrev Ryan McDougall:
> > > > > Do you agree that all applications should save their state such that
> > > > > they are no different from the time they were close to the time they
> > > > > were reopened? If you agree should this be part of the HIG or
> similar UI
> > > > > policy? What are the positive or negatives of such a policy, were it
> > > > > implemented? Should there be a unified API/framework for apps to
> reuse
> > > > > so they can store their state?
> >
> > i also think in many cases it makes sense (for example mail clients)...
> > but not everywhere . and it's not just the case of system monitoring
> > tools.
> >
> > for example it would irritate me VERY much if epiphany would restore the
> > last visited page(s) (tabbed browsing) everytime i start it.
> > there is a reason why i have closed epiphany. it is because i do not
> > want to see the webpage anymore.
> 
> I think that saving application state only makes sense if the application
> has
> been terminated (but not closed by user). For example, when the browser has
> been showing some page and you logoff without shutting down the browser.
> Otherwise, if you close the application manually there is no point to
> restore application state unless you ask the application to (selecting some
> menu item?)

There will always be some things that should get restored no matter
what. Things like which mail in the list was selected, and which folder
you were in, etc... A lot of applications already do some of the smaller
things like this, but not necessarily enough in some cases.

> > and the same also for gimp. and imho for many other apps.
> 
> something like a "restore last session" item in "File" menu.

This is what things like bookmarks and history are for. We don't want to
just be grabbing an image of what's in memory when we exit, and
restoring that by some menu item. This is part of differentiating
between the user telling things to go away, and having your system say
"Oh god, I'm blowing up!!!".

-- dobey