KPropertiesDialog. Useful graph ?

[Stefan Monov]

Hi,
First of all, a chart of sorts is badly needed in that dialog, so good idea!

However... immediately your screenie struck me as ugly and unclear. Have a 
look at XP's dialog:
http://www.genie-soft.com/images/support/drive_properties.jpg
Despite lack of AA and lack of gradients, this looks *tons* better. Why? This 
took me a while to decide, as design is always in the details ;)
It's because:
- it looks symmetric, small, cute and manageable. like something you can put 
in your pocket.
- the colors don't clash, while red + green is pretty much the bane of good 
looks :)
- no gradients at least looks normal-ish, while the gradients slapped together 
in your screenie hurt my eyes, really.

So, my suggestions:
- decrease the perspective. make the graph more narrow, and centered.
- get rid of the legend, and instead separate "used" and "free" info into 2 
rows (like XP). put the colors next to their corresponding rows.
- for a start, get rid of all gradients. ask an artist (pinheiro, ruphy) to 
make a mockup of it. This may include subdued oxygenish colors, complex (but 
sparingly used) gradients, and maybe slight translucency.
- fix the blotchy AA ;)

Vista uses a kind of progressbar for this. But that's directly in Explorer, 
wouldn't work in a dialog context.

Btw doesn't KOffice/Flake have a chart thing as well? There were discussions 
about the colors used there as well.

Thanks for your work,
Stefan