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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: [KDE Usability] Misuse of toggle buttons
From:       Matthew Woehlke <mw_triad () users ! sourceforge ! net>
Date:       2010-06-09 23:18:12
Message-ID: hup7fk$sk1$1 () dough ! gmane ! org
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Aurélien Gâteau wrote:
>  What I wanted to avoid is the
> situation where you have a "Show Sidebar" toggle button: when it is
> down, the user is faced with a button which says "Show Sidebar", but
> clicking on it will actually hide the sidebar.

Well, that's true of checkboxes also :-).

> I think using a noun instead of a verb puts more emphasis on the fact
> that the button reflects a state rather than triggers an action. Still,
> this may not always be valid though. Do you have an example where it
> would make sense for the text of a toggle button to start with a verb?

Well, I suppose I would apply the same arguments to checkboxes, and vice 
versa. If the checkbox should be "show toolbar" (verb), so should the 
toggle button. If the toggle button should be "toolbar" (noun, no verb), 
so should the checkbox.

I suppose making it a noun makes it possibly "more obvious" that the 
button is a toggle button, but I'm not convinced that's necessary.

I'm not that strongly opinionated as to the noun/verb question, more 
just that it should be the same as checkboxes... but even that isn't a 
super strong opinion.

-- 
Matthew
Please do not quote my e-mail address unobfuscated in message bodies.
-- 
Microsoft, electricity, network connectivity. For a secure system pick 
any two. -- Iain D Broadfoot (paraphrased, from cluefire.net)

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