>>>>> "John" == John Levon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

John> On Wed, Dec 18, 2002 at 11:29:41AM +0100, Jean-Marc Lasgouttes
John> wrote: No. This is not what the ellipsis means. The elipsis
John> means :
>>
John> "I need further information before I can complete your request".
>>  Where is this specified?

John> This is where I give the URLs to all the guidelines again huh ?

OK, first a note: these are guidelines for a good gnome or mac os
interface. This means that they will be relevant when we do have a
gnome or mac os port. 

John> http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/hig/1.0/menus.html

The relevant part is

  Label the menu item with a trailing ellipsis ("...") only if the
  command requires further input from the user before it can be
  performed. Do not add an ellipsis to items that only present a
  confirmation dialog (such as Delete), or that do not require further
  input (such as Properties, Preferences or About).

Note that our "about lyx..." has an ellipsis :)

I can understand that about does not need ..., since one does not need
further action to see the information. But for a preference panel,
except if one is supposed to only want to _look_ at the information
and not change it, I do not see why the ellipsis would be useless.

John> 
http://developer.apple.com/techpubs/mac/HIGuidelines/HIGuidelines-84.html#MARKER-2-83

This one says:

  The ellipsis character doesn't simply mean that a dialog box or
  window will appear. For example in the Finder File menu, the Get
  Info command doesn't have an ellipsis character and shouldn't. When
  you select a Finder object and choose Get Info, a window appears
  displaying information about the object. The window appearing simply
  completes the command. The command doesn't require additional input
  from the user before it executes.

I agree about what they say (which would indeed apply to "about"), but
note also that in their "Do this instead" example there is a menu item
"Publisher Options..." :)

I think you are misreading these guidelines. 

I will complete this with the KDE style guide 
  http://developer.kde.org/documentation/standards/kde/style/menus/index.html
which says
  
  Notice that every item in a menu that first opens a dialog requiring
  additional information must be labelled with a trailing ellipsis
  (...) (e.g. Save As..., Open...). There's no space between the menu
  item and the "...". A simple confirmation dialog is not considered a
  dialog that requires additional information.

I do not see here anything validating your claims.

>> I do not see this in mozilla, nor in the

John> Hardly a bastion of good UI !

Have you read mpt too much lately? [in fact I tend to agree with
you...]

JMarc

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