It seems to me that those seeking to make decisions about OpenOffice, particularly the user interface, are plagued by the perpetual question: Is this for power users, or average users?
Just look at the recent discussion on tabbed windows, already the issue of 'sessions' have provoked that same old question... The answer is naturally that it is for both. average users are obviously important, but power users are invaluable to support any basis of a claim to 'quality'. On top of this is the debate as to how like Microsoft Office we should be, which follows a similar line. The answer I see is to make the interface configurable in as many ways as possible, so when tabs are introduced make them optional, and same with the way they are grouped, and sessions. Or when the page in writer finally gets centered, allow it to use the old or new behavior. And then provide a mechanism by which configuration sets can be saved and loaded (an improvement in itself) on top of that it would make sense to, at install time, or first use time, query the user as to what default configuration set they would like to use. for example: 1:power user. 2:simplified. 3:Microsoft Office like. 4:Open Office Classic Thus we can stop worrying about whether it is the 'right thing' for the interface and mixing the power user with the simplified. As well as providing an advanced mechanism for keeping ones personal configuration Not to mention it being something that MSO doesn't implement... :) -- Chris Monahan --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
