On Sun, Aug 24, 2003 at 01:35:36AM +0100, Richard Urwin wrote: > There are no stock objects for Import and Export. Rather than adding > simple labled buttons, I decided this way was the lesser of the two > evils.
That explains why they're called "Save As" and "Open" for GTK2; however, it doesn't explain why they're not called "Save As" and "Open" for GKT1.2. If Import and Export are the "right" labels, then simple labeled buttons, rather than different names in GTK1.2 and GTK2, is probably the lesser of two evils. If Import and Export are no more "right" than Save As and Open, then they should be called Save As and Open in GTK1.2 as well. I.e., the labels should be based on what makes sense to a user, not what the API makes easier - and what makes sense to a user doesn't, I suspect, depend on whether they're using a GTK 1.2[.x] or GTK 2.x version of the application. I'm not sure where "Import" and "Export" are used in various GUIs - I think they might be used in some cases where you're loading some data file from another application, and saving data in a format for another application. If that's what they typically mean, perhaps "Save As" is better than "Export"; I'm not sure about "Open", though - perhaps "Load" is more appropriate? (I think that's what Network Monitor, for example, uses to load a filter expression from a named file.)