Review of background dialog.

[Benoit Walter]

> A review of the background settings dialog reviewed the following issues:

> 1) Meaning of "Blending" options is unclear.
It has been already discussed, but as very few people understand it and fewer 
people use it, my opinion is that it should be in the advanced dialog. OTOH, 
if we move it there, another preview monitor is needed in the advanced 
dialog... And removing feature is not always a solution... but who needs 
Blending? A deadlock.

> 2) "Position" refers to the position of the picture but this is not clear.
Using buttons which clearly shows the position of the image in the screen 
would be a big improvement for usability. Mockups (or prototype) are needed.

> 3) The comobox behind "Colors" lists a variety of gradients and patterns
> including two empty entries.
Are you sure? No empty entry in my recent version.

> 4) The option for the background icon text color is hidden under Advanced
> where it is very hard to find.
It is related to backround, perhaps. But I think it would be much better to 
have this option in the Icons tab of the "Desktop Behaviour" dialog. I think 
it makes more sense, for example the tab is only enabled when icons on 
desktop are enabled. In the background dialog, it is hidden when icons on 
desktop are disabled, which makes it more difficult to find the option in 
case you re-enable icons on desktop...

> 5) The title "Options" of the groupbox is meaningless.
Perhaps "Settings" :-) It is actually a good example of a frame that is only 
there for esthetical purposes, but the reason why elements are grouped 
together is hard to explain . Without frame, if would not look good... 
Perhaps using an horizontal separator and include it in the "background" 
frame? But then, we have only 1 frame, whose name is the name of the 
dialog........

I will create some new UI when I have some time, but my opinion is to create 
some space (in removing frames? removing blending option?) and use meaningful 
buttons/dropdowns for position and gradient (as the ones in the panel 
appearance dialog?).

Regards,
Benoit.