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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: KOffice Dialog Box
From:       "Aaron J. Seigo" <aseigo () olympusproject ! org>
Date:       2002-06-15 8:41:52
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On June 15, 2002 10:59 am, Joseph Manojlovich wrote:
> Hey everybody. After a pointless email exchange with one of the KOffice

for those who didn't read the thread: it wasn't pointless, the koffice devels 
simply brought up issues that didn't get answers; therefore the request 
wasn't granted (and no code was offered in any case) ...

> My friend and I had asked for the option of not showing the dialog box
> to be available. The developer did not agree, to put it mildly, and
> proceeded to talk about how the user "can just hit enter" to get past
> the dialog, among other things. The full email exchange is available
> here:

the counter points they presented are actually quite good and were left 
unanswered. they didn't say "no, it will stay, so there!" so much as "but if 
we remove it, we are left with the following challenges and we know of no 
good solution for them"

e.g. how does one easily change the default once it has been set?

and no, using a menu item that usually isn't for that purpose isn't good 
enough.

and no, just because every other office suite is broken by design doesn't mean 
koffice should be (not to say that koffice doesn't have many other serious 
usability problems)

and yes, that dialog is dismissable with a simple press of the enter button. 
you suggest that the dialog should be accessable via File -> New; if it is so 
much of a burden then it shouldn't be pushed on the user there either.

in reality, there should be no difference between openning a new document by 
File->New and opening a new document by clicking on the office app's icon.

also note that the dialog has more function that simply "open a new file"... 
in future it will even take on wizard capabilities...

> http://www2.sis.pitt.edu/~josephm/koffice-insanity.html

/me rolls eyes at the name of that file

in future, can i suggest just posting a link to the lists.kde.org archive so 
you don't have to go through trouble of cut 'n pasting  and we can read the 
full thread?

> I suggest reading it; It's quite amusing, I think, and informative.
>
> My question is, what do the people on this list have to say about the
> issue? I personally don't see how making the dialog box optional, for
> the 90% of people who probably don't use it/like it anyway, is such a
> terrible idea.

your answers in the koffice-devel thread.

btw, do you have some evidence that 90% of people don't like it? or that it 
bothers people to a great degree?

> Also, I had asked for usability polls on this and other issues, to
> give users more of a voice about developer choices in UI design.
> Anybody care to weigh in on that idea?

general user polls are generally useless ... people willing to observe and 
report on users performing specific tasks are quite useful, on the other 
hand.

- -- 
Aaron J. Seigo
GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA  EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43

"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler" 
    - Albert Einstein
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