On Jul 8, 2009, at 3:53 AM, Andy Armstrong wrote:
On 8 Jul 2009, at 04:23, Joshua Juran wrote:
But in the Gnome world it does, and this makes me want to strangle
kittens.
Can you point me to the research showing the effect this has on
user efficiency, or failing that, at least a design document
comparable to Apple's Human Interface Guidelines for the
Macintosh? Or is this just an oral tradition passed on by those
with their GUI well poisoned by X11, who then complain when
everybody else does it differently?
You're being ironic or something, right? You don't actually believe
that people's personal preferences have to be backed up by research
do you?
Not ironic, but curious. I'm looking for some kind of organized
statement of what the preferred behavior is (i.e. HIG) and why it's
preferable.
Users are entitled to configure their systems however they like with
no justification whatsoever. But I have little sympathy for the
argument that *someone else* should implement support[1] for such
preferences without at least a rationale.
[1] As in fully functional support that people won't hate.
I've never used FFM either - but if I was implementing it I'd make
damn sure I consulted someone who had and respected their preferences.
Bingo -- I'm considering implementing it. First I need to know if
it's worth implementing, which requires knowing what problem it
solves. If it's not just a fetish[2], but a real problem (without a
better solution[3]), it's likely I would do so.
[2] Fetishes include extensionless filenames and Mac apps written in
Cocoa instead of Carbon.
[3] It's even more likely that I would invent a variant behavior and
implement that.
Josh
