Michel, Fyi, your post is extremely difficult to read due to poor formatting (no line-wrapping and more importantly no paragraph breaks).
Charles On 2010-10-15 10:03 AM, Michel Gagnon wrote: > Le 2010-10-14 18:03, Mirek M. acrit:Hi everyone, Since it seems like > LibreOffice won't adopt the UI Oracle's preparing for OOo, I'm starting > a massive LibreOffice UI proposal series. Here's the > intro:http://clickortap.wordpress.com/2010/10/14/citrus-ui/Hello,I > wonder what is the interest of Microsoft and others, including you, to > replace menus with a ribbon-like interface. I think it brings the worst > in terms of usability. Why?We have grown to use a certain menu > organization. File, Edit, Format, Tools, Windows and Help are, in that > order, fairly standard menu items in all applications, and even the > basic list of menu items is even fairly standardized. The ribbon > interface changes that to a certain extent and requires a relearning > process.There are a few menu items that are easily displayed with icons, > but most icons are either very hard to read or require a lot of real > estate or both. Look at Microsoft Word or at WordPad on System 7 and > look at icons used for page or paragraph margins, or for search and > replace (very similar to the one for spelling). Because of that, Ms > Office 2010 and WordPad adds text below many icons (more real estate) > and a tool tip which is basically the former menu item.Because of real > estate requirements, there are a limited number of buttons that may be > displayed on a screen, whether it is with a traditional set of buttonsla > Office 3.2 or with a ribbonla Microsoft Office 2007-2010. So there is a > need for multiple menus that call different ribbons like Ms Office. or > buttons that need still another action like custom margins.Using a > typical menu item requires one move with the mouse: move it to the top > to select the menu and slide it toward the menu item, then release. Sub > menus require a little more dexterity.On the other hand, using a typical > ribbon "menu" item requires a move and two clicks: a first click at the > top to select the proper ribbon, then a click on the proper icon. And > because of the limited real estate, it is more likely that one then > falls onto yet another dialogue box.A traditional tool bar is always > there; so its commands may be accessed very quickly. But it works only > because of its limited number of icons.So what would be the best > approach? Probably a mix of both systems.A traditional menu system for > structured commands. In a word processor, I see comprehensive commands > like Page setup, Paragraph setup, Font setup, Style setup (with a dialog > box like that of Office 2003), Table setup, etc. Simple commands like > "Align to the left" could either be in a submenu or even forgotten > altogether because they already are accessible through the Paragraph > Setup dialog box. Displaying them in a submenu makes learning and > training easier : the command is seen, its shortcut is seen, etc.If a > ribbon-like approach is used, there should be shortcuts not only for > items, but also for each of the ribbons. For instance, I should be able > to press alt-F for the File ribbon, alt-E to show the Edit ribbon, > etc... and each of these shortcuts should become as standard as > control-Z, X, C and V for the basic cut and paste possibilities.Of > course, control-C for Cut and control-shift-L (or control-L) for > Align-left should also exist for a direct access to menus.Icons are good > when the graphic is obvious to all and when clicking on it has a direct > result. One of the major pitfalls I currently see is that most are > non-configurable (same problem with Microsoft Office and OpenOffice). So > for me, the Left-Align and Bold icons work (but the keyboard shortcuts > are so quicker), but the bullet icon doesn't work because it does not > use my preferred settings: I would like it to apply my "Bullet 1" > setting (usually a hanging indent of 1 pica with no further indent, but > some documents have a different style definition). Ditto for the 5 or 6 > different Page Setting icons that are defined in Ms Word 2007: none of > them have the margins I need for my documents!How would a mixed system > work?One way to do it would be to have the menus first, followed by > ribbons. For instance, the new LibreOffice would have File-Edit-Display > (maybe)-Insert-Format-Table-Tools-Window menus, then Basic (file and > edit ribbon items)-Insert-Format (document, paragraph and text > items)-Table ribbons. The menu could appear either on a single line or > on two lines if/when the window is too narrow.Finally, should a ribbon > sit on the right or at the top? Why not have it either way? The ribbon > is a glorified toolbar and traditional toolbars have worked in either > position, either docked or undocked. So why not have the "ribbon menus" > call a toolbar anyway?By the way, since we talk of a new interface, one > aspect I don't like of OpenOffice 3.x are the toolbars that appear and > disappear according to paragraph styles. For instance, when bullets are > chosen (or a bullet style), the bullet toolbar appears (by default at > the top) and shifts all text down 1 cm. Go back to a standard paragraph > and it shifts up again. Why not have a user interface made with one or > two user-defined toolbars like we currently have on OpenOffice 3.x and > Ms Office 2003, plus one toolbar that would be always there, albeit with > variable content (a.k.a. the "ribbon"). Users would decide where they > want that big grey box and LibreOffice would fill in the proper > icons.--Michel [email protected] (Qubec, > Canada)mgagnon.net -- To unsubscribe, e-mail to > [email protected] All messages you send to this list > will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted. List archives are > available at http://www.documentfoundation.org/lists/discuss/ -- Best regards, Charles Marcus I.T. Director Media Brokers International, Inc. 678.514.6200 x224 | 678.514.6299 fax -- E-mail to [email protected] for instructions on how to unsubscribe List archives are available at http://www.documentfoundation.org/lists/discuss/ All messages you send to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted
