replacing kcontrol with system settings

[Ellen Reitmayr]

On Thursday 14 June 2007, Boudewijn Rempt wrote:
> On Thursday 14 June 2007, Jonathan Riddell wrote:
> > This is a frontend to kcontrol module with a user interface which
> > scales better for users compared to the simple tree view of kcontrol.

+1 
(yay!) :)

still I agree with Boudewijn - I'd also like to see some more things fixed in 
System Settings:

> It's still got its share of big problems. It's a simple carbon-copy of OS X
> preferences app -- without the only really useful bit of the origial, the
> feature where you can drag often used control panel icons onto a bar. 

> And 
> its layout management is definitely not good enough; it wastes oodles of
> screen space, especially if you open it after having used a big control
> panel last time. 

i agree - the size of the window "jumps" when you open a big panel. this 
should not be the case (see HIG checklists: 
http://wiki.openusability.org/guidelines/index.php/Checklist_Configuration_Dialogs 
point 3)

> The tile bars under icons show really weird word breaks 
> (User - Managemen - t on my system). 

+ the items are not accessible using the keyboard. that needs to be fixed.

> And after years of claiming that 
> having ordinary and advanced buttons wasn't a solution, that's just what
> system settings provides.

unlike kcontrol, systemsettings wants to guide the user to set up the most 
important parts of the work environment.  that's the information given on the 
first tab. to make systemsettings be a real alternative for kcontrol, we 
still had to provide the more advanced settings.

i agree that it is better to include advanced options into the context of use 
(that would be an advanced icon within a group on the first tab rather than a 
separate advanced tab), but in this case, most the options on the second tab 
don't fit well in any of the groups of the first tab. plus we did not have 
the resources to modify the navigational scheme (which would have been 
required otherwise). we tested the information architecture in several user 
tests, and the results were promising.

i think that all in all, systemsettings is way better organised than kcontrol.

> Not that I oppose your proposal; it's just that I think that if anything,
> system settings is not in any way beyond mediocre. But then, KControl,
> although not such a blatant clone of somebody else's work, isn't really
> better.

heh, right.

If there is a volunteer (developer), I'd like to spend more time and love in 
systemsettings (fix the above issues and revise parts of the gui). 

/el


-- 
Ellen Reitmayr
KDE Usability Project
usability.kde.org
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