FreeLists / openbeos / [openbeos] Re: BeOS/Haiku UI question

["Marcus Overhagen" <marcusoverhagen@xxxxxxxx>]

Simon Taylor wrote:

> 
> For me BeOS is primarily about responsiveness. That basically means settings 
> should be instantly applied as they are changed.
I agree with this.

> Not many BeOS pref panels have a "Default" button and I'm not sure they're 
> particularly useful - if the settings are applied instantly the user can test 
> and "Revert" to the previous ones (which would be the default on the first 
> opening of the settings panel anyway). Complicated settings panels that 
> require more testing from the user about whether or not it's a good choice 
> could have a button to set defaults I suppose - but if the user can make 
> things so bad by changing the settings that a defaults button is required 
> then maybe the question of "why are we actually presenting this as an option 
> to the user?" should be asked.
Well, default buttons are a good thing. most times.

> Settings that obviously can't be applied in real time (screen prefs and 
> others) should have an "Apply" button.
Yes, like Screen, but not many others.

> I think the normal close button should just do that - close the window. The 
> next time I opened 
> the window I would expect it to be in exactly the same state as when I closed 
> it.
I agree. This is intiutive, if you are not wrecked by Windows.

> The way I think about it, settings are always there determining how my 
> computer works, whether or not I have a window open to show them to me. Thus 
> I find the whole windows "Cancel" concept quite confusing - I don't actually 
> want to "Cancel" my printer settings as I still want windows to know about 
> the printer I had configured. What I actually want to do is "Revert" the 
> settings to how they were before I started changing them and then close the 
> window.
Agreed.

In my opinion, a good preference panel should work like this:

- Only have one [Revert] button by default.
- Changing any settings should be applied in realtime.
- Closing the window should not alter settings.
- Add a [Defaults] button if useful (keyboard and mouse)
- Add a [Apply] button if changes can't be applied in realtime (Screen).

- Revert *must* be able to revert all changes since *starting* the app, 
including those that were [Apply]ed
- It's NOT useful at all to have a close button
- The order of [Defaults] [Revert] and optionally [Apply] buttons should be 
consistent


Some preferences use "Save", "Use", "Done" and "Apply". I think this should be 
reviewed,
and changed into "Apply".

Some review of preference apps (my opinion):

BeOS R5 Backgrounds is unable to revert changes that were applied. Very bad, I 
now have a pink background 
with a strange picture, and can't revert or restore the default :-(((((

Backgrounds should have [Revert] [Defaults], changes should be applied in 
realime.

Email has Revert, Cancel and Save, and "closing the window". thats no so good.
Don't know what it should have

Fonts should have [Revert] [Defaults], changes should be applied to all running 
apps in realtime, (perhaps with [Apply] button)

Keyboard should have [Revert] [Defaults], 

Btw, it would be nice to have a wizard during the first setup, that walks you 
through all required settings (at least in R2)

regards
Marcus