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List:       kde-core-devel
Subject:    Re: Patch for KMix
From:       Christian Esken <c.esken () cityweb ! de>
Date:       2003-11-30 6:27:12
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On Saturday 29 November 2003 23:14, Scott Wheeler wrote:
> On Saturday 29 November 2003 23:05, Christian Esken wrote:
> > here is a patch for KMix, that hides the "Advanced"  checkbox if it is
> > unused.
> > This fix is for all users using OSS (many many Linux users still use OSS,
> > addditionaly a lot of *BSD* users).
> > OK to commit?
>
> Uhm, usability nitpick -- I'm using ALSA and it's completely unclear what
> benefits "Advanced" gives me.
>
> I'd vote for moving the option into the menubar, configuration dialog or
> even disabling it since without "what's this" items it's not clear to me
> (even as a multimedia developer) what the extra buttons are for.

And if the option is in the menubar it would get clearer?

Disabling is absolutely out-of-question, as important soundcard-dependent 
switches are available there, like input selection (Optical vs Coax SPDIF).
The "Advanced" options are already hidden by default.

And it is a driver matter, whether these options are understandable or not. 
For example the "nForce2" driver has options like "Swap Surround", "Duplicate 
Front", "Exchange Center/LFE". You can easily understand those by their name 
(or by clicking them and hearing the difference).

Chris

PS: There can never be a "what'sthis" for all switches, as each driver can 
have its own specialities and thus can invent own names.
PPS: The layout will change *after* KDE3.2, there will be some re-ordering and 
grouping of switches (recording / input / surround).

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