KDE 4: Text labels underneath toolbar icons

[Stephen Leaf]

On Sunday 14 January 2007 3:29 pm, David Jarvie wrote:
> On Sunday 14 January 2007 22:04, Stephen Leaf wrote:
> > On Friday 12 January 2007 2:16 pm, Dennis P wrote:
> > > First a rant.
> > >
> > > KDE 4 will feature text labels underneath toolbar icons by default. As
> > > explained in http://oxygen-icons.org/users/david/?p=31 the texts spread
> > > the icons too much. The suggested solution is simple: make shorter text
> > > labels, the 9 characters of "Save as" are clearly too long and should
> > > just be "Save", "New message" should be "Write" or maybe "Compose"
> > > should be allowed which still uses 7 characters.
> >
> > This maybe me nit-picking and/or stating the obvious. But When shortening
> > the wording for a button be careful not to shorten it too far.
> > For example the "Save as" is vastly different from "Save" in applications
> > such as kate, kword, etc.
>
> I think he was just saying this to illustrate how much space labels really
> need if they are to mean anything. Later in his message he mentions the
> fact that other languages often need even more space for their translations
> than meaningful English labels.
Yes I was just stating a quick point to not go too rambunctious about 
enforcing a short short naming scheme. As thats what it appeared to me with 
the "'Save as' is clearly too long"
Also I did mention I was possibly stating the obvious :)
I do agree with him on many points. 
stating a limit may make people think its a must and might sacrifice 
description for space. Space is important, but if you don't know what the 
button is, what good is the button?
click it and find out only works with adventurous people. I know of a few that 
have gone about things the long way simply because they didn't know what the 
button on their toolbar did.
I'm for the whole, Stress, but you don't need to enforce. on small things like 
this.

> Tim Beaulen <tbscope at gmail.com>
> Just show tooltips, but don't wait a second, show them instantly.
> Voila, every icon has text, without actually putting the text in the
> toolbar itself (because that will never work).
Maybe a macosx panel bar styled toolbar? ;)
icons would in large text would be displayed in a form of a tooltip shown 
instantly. also voila every icon has text and more spaces to put that text 
in. (and again might never work)

-- 
Stephen Leaf