Gnome Article on UI Design on /.

[Matthias Elter]

On Monday 22 April 2002 02:43, Nick Papadonis wrote:
> Ralf Nolden <nolden at kde.org> writes:
> > would like to contribute to fundament my position here for that KDE gets
> > too complicated, I would like to point on the current slashdot.org
> > article about Havoc's views about GNOME's UI design here:
> >
> > http://slashdot.org/developers/02/04/21/051228.shtml?tid=131
(...)
>   - There are simply TOO many configurable options in the control
> center.  Time to take the MS Windows approach, leave the most common
> preferences here and place other in a registry (or config file).
>
>   - These configurable settings are a result of the inability to side
> with a single idea.  Maybe the most popular ideas should be sided with
> ( vote ) and others be a hidden option for users?

I also read Havocs article and I agree with most of what he says. Your 
proposal seems to address the "Preferences can confuse many users." problem 
he mentions. However it does not address any of the other problems he 
mentions:

- "Preferences have a cost." Even if there is no GUI for a setting it 
increases code complexity.

- "Too many preferences means you can't find any of them."  This is especially 
true for settings hidden in configuration files.

- "Preferences really substantively damage QA and testing." With hidden 
settings this is a real nightmare.

- "Preferences make integration and good UI difficult." Again, your proposal 
wont solve this.

Greetings,
Matthias