jesus X wrote:
> This is another think that irks me. The themes idea is an OUTGROWTH of the XP
> effort. It's a BONUS, not a detractor. When going with an easy XP UI, it became
> trivial to see how the UI could be changed by anyone via themes and skins.
Just to go in on a sidetrail here in the discussion. As someone very
interested in HCI I fail to see the big benefit of the UI being able to
"be changed by anyone". I firmly believe that the UI is a fundamental
part of any application. A program is never better than the use it is to
the user and if the user can't get it to do what he/she wants it _is_ a
bad program, no matter what standards it follows or it's lean and mean.
Designing a good UI is not trivial. One of the most important features
of a good UI is that you snould not make it very customizable or
changing. This makes the user learn and expect where the controls are
and the user feels comfortable. This is why a _GUI_ of such a complex
application fails to utilize the great potential of the Bazaar method.
I can understand that XPFE is a good thing from one developer viewpoint.
I also understand that skin changing is a nice feature to throw into a
new modern application. But I can't understand why this customizability
don't stop at Winamp-level: Change of appareance but not functionality.
When every different computer and user will have an application that
behaves differently from each other you won't get public feel for the
product.
I also understand that this is an architectual decision made a long time
ago. I just would like to know the reasoning behind the decision... :)
/Daggi
