Since I am a person generally maintaining all this stuff, I presume it is time for me to participate a bit...
> window to about 2000*740 pixels, some of the writing is still too small > to be shown as distinct characters (particularly on the numeric > keypad). Agree. Is there any standard approach to zooming in GNOME which would be applicable here? > * Let windows have a preferred size, which the window manager can > ignore if the screen's not that big. I will probably do this anyway, it is cheap. > * Arrange the unShifted and Shifted characters horizontally on each > key, instead of vertically, allowing for a bigger font. Invalid. There are shift levels and groups - so both X and Y axes are used. > * Make modified characters appear only when that modifier key is held > down (à la Key Caps on classic Mac OS), so the whole of each key > can be used to display one character at a time. It may be ok for the current layout. But what about the layout preview in the g-k-p - when you only going to choose the keyboard? You cannot reliably say "this button WOULD BE pressed if this layout is chosen into the configuration". > * Use less padding for each key in the diagram. The geometry is read dynamically from xorg configuration files. Sure you are free to submit patches. > * Use a transparent background for the diagrams (but not the keys), > so the layouts can go right up to the edges of their diagrams. It would look strange, wouldn't it? > * (Worst option) Use a tooltip for each key. Really not nice... > > Of course not! It's the amazingly named 'Group Shift/Lock behavior' > > option in the next tab. No, *nothing* in this label indicates is has > > anything to do with layouts, unless you happen to know [t]hat some > > kinds of layouts are called 'groups'. This is a real problem. And the worst part of it is that I do not really know the right solution to it. The fact is that group ~= layout (_approximately_ same thing). I would be happy to hide the word "group" from people altogether but I cannot. > To laugh, or to cry? That is the question. Think!:) > > Once again, AFAIK, this text is determined by X, not GNOME. So we're > > stuck with it. Not at all. Since I am managing xkeyboard-config which is going to be adopted by most of distros (if not already adopted) - we CAN change this text. > How so? Does Xorg really have the text "R-Alt switches group while > pressed.", etc, in it somewhere? locate xorg.xml > Further evidence that there is no such thing as the notification area. > It's too small to show notifications, so it's used mostly for other > things. Agree! > >> menu:". If you could guarantee that the keyboard combo for cycling Noone can guarantee this. Unless you want to remove the choice of the layout switching shortcut (over my dead body). > To get back to your original problem about how to document this, I > suggesting writing a step-by-step "How to use multiple keyboard > layouts", using apologetic humor to pick around the whole Charlie > Foxtrot. <http://g2meyer.com/usablehelp/singles/245.html> I would love to read it:) > > We're limited to the choice of keys by X... Yes that's a fact. > > So basically, a lot of our problems with this pref > > tool, and with keyboard layouts in general, are down > > to problems in X. 101% agree. Cheers, Sergey _______________________________________________ Usability mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/usability
