Question about the style guide

[Datschge]

> David Faure and I was discussing kword's and kivio's configure dialogs and
> a question came up that we both are a bit unsure about.
> In a tabed dialog should the apply button only apply the current tab or the
> whole dialog? What's best usability wise? The same applies to the default
> button...

At the moment it's the de facto rule that Apply and OK always apply all 
changes in the whole dialog. The only exception I'm aware of is the Control 
Center where the user gets notified that changes were done and whether he 
wants to apply or discard them. The latter strikes me as not really intuitive 
since it's possibly hindering the workflow, so the former is imo preferable.

In the long run a new standardized widget features could be introduced which 
mark tabs or fields which has been changed with a disk icon like it's already 
done with window/taskbar titles or something like that, but I'd suggest that 
Apply and OK should keep confirming all changes done in all cases since this 
behavior, if kept consistent in all applications, is the one with the least 
surprise.

Cheers, Datschge =)