- This topic has 38 replies, 8 voices, and was last updated Nov 28-6:13 pm by Wallon.
- Posts
Robin
Some questions about logical structure of this UI: Since there is a button reading „unblock everything”, where is the button „unblock selected”, you’d intuitively expect when reading this? And does the button „unblock everything” leave the dialog after executing, just as the „OK” probably does? In this case it is actually a second OK button. If so, the wording „OK” doesn’t make much sense and I’d propose to rename the „OK” button to „unblock selected”.
Windows is like a submarine. Open a window and serious problems will start.
WallonDear developers,
On line 32, there is a variable declared with the expression “export”.
I can’t find the child script that needs this variable.
export title=$"antiX Advert Blocker"
I would remind you that it is dangerous to export a variable if there is no child script. Many scripts use this “title” variable.
Before trying to use “export” in scripts, the real question is “Is there a child process that needs this variable? If yes, export, if no, keep everything local in the script. If you want to export too much, you run the risk of “namespace pollution”, i.e. you sometimes end up with scripts of different origins that use the same variable names and conflict with each other.In addition, this variable is translated in the *.pot file. If the variable needs the term in English only, it cannot be translated normally.
Best regards,
Wallon
Brian MasinickGood catch Wallon. As you indicate, export is useful for variables that are the same, common to an entire environment.
Variables that are either 100% local or ones that can be passed through an argument list do not, and in cases like a title, should arguably NOT be defined as an exported variable; that may lead to many cases of inaccurate, common title name wherever title is referenced, NOT the intended behavior!--
Brian MasinickWallonHello Brian,
Thank you for confirming this technical note. As we are a small community, we absolutely must share our knowledge and experience. You are also of great added value to the antiX community.
Kind regards,
WallonPPC
Dear all:
– I just picked up our current Ad Block script and tried to make it more intuitive to work with, and better looking too. I tried not to change anything that was not related to localization, the way the windows look or how the main window processed selections (that stopped the options of what can be blocked from being localized and implied the use of Case and the If-then, when only a simple If-then works perfectly).
– I did not change anything related to system wide variables, so that’s a long standing possible problem, that’s probably in the script even before I started using antiX, and seems to never have caused problems. I assumed that the title variable was exported so it could be used from inside functions, I did not check if doing it was really required, and I won’t do so now, I have already spent many, many hours working on this script
– On the contents of the button that applies the selection… “Ok” is de the default content for such buttons, as is “Apply”, but I’ll defere to anticapitalista on that, of course. He can select what term he thinks should be on that button (or in any button, in fact, it’s his OS). NOTE: initially, I adapted the “Cancel” button to state what that button did, something like “Exit without performing any change”. Then I though- this is stupid, I’m just wasting words. There’s an expression that always means that, on any GUI… it’s called just “Cancel”. In my personal opinion, saying something like “Apply current selection” is more detailed… but, in the end, a waste of words, merely “OK” or just “Apply” is what the average user expects to see on a configuration screen such as this. This just proves what I usually say: you can’t please everyone. To be honest, I’m tempted to stop trying to do so… The script worked basically as it was for over 10 years… and no one complained… I started tweaking it, and then people start finding problems… sighP.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
WallonDear PPC,
If you read my message, I started by writing “Dear developers”.
So you weren’t directly targeted.
Please don’t take this the wrong way. As I often say, we need to share our knowledge and experience.
It’s only together that we can improve antiX scripts.
Regarding the “OK” button in the “Ad Block” script, I think it means;
Leave the application,
or
Exit the application,
or
Close application.Kind regards,
WallonDear Wallon- please don’t think I was complaining about you… Trying to help develop software is complex and frustrating and does tire me. It’s particulary more frustrating when adapting something, instead of developing it from scratch…
I’m glad the community keeps an eye out for potential problems in the programs antiX uses, but I won’t be touching this script any time soon, not unless I introduced some kind of bug with my tweaks…On the “OK” button – now I’m really confused… If for you “ok” means
Leave the application,
or
Exit the application,
or
Close application.What does the “Cancel button” mean to you? I’m not being sarcastic, I’m truly curious. I may disagree with Robin about what should be on the “Ok” button- technically “Apply changes” (or even just “apply”) would be a more detailed description of what it does.
As a matter of personal taste, I like the universality of an “Ok” button, that always means acceptance of what’s on screen. In this cases, however, in the future, I’ll probably stick with “Apply”, “Apply current selection”, or similar contents. One of the reasons I like simple “OK” buttons is that most people on the planet know what that means (not counting my good friend Marcelo- it seems that, in his part of Brazil, that is not something people say to display agreement- in Portugal, it’s part of our vocabulary). Since most languages use that expression, even if a bit adapted, I always thought its meaning was as close to an universal agreement statement as possible.P.
Brian Masinick@Wallon – You are correct; in this particular context, “OK” does mean either leave the application, exit the application or close the application.
In a menu, an exit or quit label is often used.
In a graphical application with widget buttons, OK or cancel are more commonly used. Their context is understood, not by the widget label, but instead by the visible text in the application window, saying something like “When finished, to exit, click OK”, to cancel the current operation or return to the main menu, click “Cancel”. The exact texts that I’ve quoted above depend on the specific activity taking place.
So to summarize, window manager entries, such as the File menu in a Web browser, usually have a Quit entry, which will also include a keystroke sequence, such as Ctrl+Q to quit, or possibly an Exit entry, which may then use Ctrl+X. In the Quit example, if there is a letter “accelerator” with the entry, Quit will have Q underlined as the accelerator, and Exit will have x underlined as the accelerator. In the nineties I worked on Digital UNIX and we did a lot of work to make the use of Quit, Exit, File, etc. consistent, and also provided consistent meta and control key sequences.
Therefore, both of you have very good points. As long as there is an explanation in the user interface of the application, I would also advocate the use of a dialogue that includes something like, “To Quit, click OK or to cancel the current operation, press cancel.” Otherwise use the window manager X box or the exit mechanism provided by the system. Does this make sense to both of you? If not, let’s have a cordial discussion, and we can reference some “best practice” documents on user interface design if needed. I don’t have such documents at my fingertips, but in work I’ve done in the distant past, such information has been available and I’d be VERY surprised if something isn’t still available, possibly superior to what we had available way back when…
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Brian MasinickWallonDear PPC,
Our friend Brian summed up my thoughts very well. Thank you Brian for your intervention.
I think that the meaning of “OK” is not obvious in all languages.
I select the “OK” button and then what? Does that apply the changes or not? Does it close a window, a process, an application, software?
In the “Ad Block” script, in my French, “OK” means close a window, close the application, close the script.
So as “OK” isn’t precise enough without a good context, I think that for all languages, it’s better not to use it.
It’s better to have buttons like Add, Modify, Delete, Apply changes, Print, Exit, Quit, Close.Dear PPC, I really appreciate everything you do for the community.
Kind regards,
Wallon
anticapitalista@Wallon – so how do you manage when prompted for a password? 🙂
The pop-up menu has Cancel and OK.Philosophers have interpreted the world in many ways; the point is to change it.
antiX with runit - leaner and meaner.
I want to cut down the time I spend contributing to antiX, but it would be great to see some uniform UI guide lines come out of something I started.
I don’t have Mr. Masinick’s experience (I’ve never been an IT professional, not exactly), but I’ll try to lay down some concepts, that I gathered from using computers for over 30 years:
– On any kind of GUI, when faced with the buttons “OK” and “Cancel”, I’ve always assumed this:
– “Ok” means “I accept what’s being shown on that particular window and want to proceed with it”
– “Cancel” means “I do not accept what’s being currently shown in that window and I want to cancel the process that caused that window to be displayed”. Usually, just manually closing the window (clicking the close icon button on the title bar, closing it from it’s entry on the toolbar, using F4 or any other hot key that closes the currently focused window, etc) has the same effect as canceling what the window proposes to do.For me, “OK”, or “Apply” or “Continue” buttons do not mean, in any way, that I want to exit the application (unless that’s the option the window is showing me). On a configuration GUI, when faced with a choice, it means that I accept the current selection and I want the software to do what it’s proposing.
This prompted me to test some of the applications that come with antiX out of the box, in Control Centre (the test was done on a pt-pt system, so I’, translating the results):
– the wallpaper setter, to accept the change, the main window button reads “Apply”, the “cancel” button reads “close”
– the LXappearance apps also reads, “close” and “apply”
– the set default apps GUI reads, “cancel” and “apply”
– the dpi tool reads “cancel” and “apply” (or rather Apply and Cancel, opposed to what we usually see)
– Synaptic seems to use “Cancel” and “Mark” (using the verb related to what the action does), when selecting packages, when really installing anything, the options are “Cancel” and “Apply”
– Repo manager shows “Apply” and “Cancel” buttons.
– Keyboard selection shows “OK”, “Cancel” and “Apply”
– Connman shows “OK” and “Cancel”
– the default Ad Block shows “Cancel” and “OK” (that I choose to keep, when I updated the script)
– Set blank shows “V” and “X”
– Automount shows “Apply” and “Close”
– Print configuration shows “Apply”, “Cancel” and “Ok”
– System Info shows “OK” and “Quit”
– Mouse options shows “V” and “X”
– User management shows “Apply” and “Close”There is no uniform pattern on all this choices, and I seem to be on the minority, thinking “Ok” means “I accept what is being proposed”. It seems that “Apply” is more used to show agreement, on most of these UI’s. I assume that when a GUI displays “Apply” and “Ok”, the first option means “apply current selection and continue editing” and “Ok” means “apply current selection and exit this configuration screen”, but I did not test this (but it’s what I usually think “OK” means)…
I’m aware that one of the most used Open Source pieces of software in the World, LibreOffice, on it’s “Options” window does use “Cancel”, “Apply” and “Ok” in this context. On the rest of the GUI it usually just uses “OK” and “Cancel”.
One of the other most used pieces of Open Source software, Firefox, uses “Cancel” and “Ok”From this short analysis I propose that “Cancel” should be used as default label for buttons that close the current window without accepting what it proposed and “Apply” should be used to “Apply the changes/options/configuration” proposed by the window. If users have a third option: to accept changes and instantly close the configuration window, “Ok” should be used. In case users can only cancel ou accept what the window proposes, I think “Apply” is more widely used in antiX configuration apps, and “Ok” is more widely used in generic Open Source Apps.
For now, since we have no Guide Line from anticapitalista (or the community), I’ll just keep my favorite “Ok”, when I think it works fine- if it works for Mozilla and for LibreOffice, it works fine for me too… If possible, the translation team can always localize “Ok” or “Apply” for their preferred terms (now that I think about it, I think I did not mark “Ok” as a localizable string, I just used the default “gtk-ok” yad button, that shows “V OK” (it’s not my fault if yad does not have that localized, but yes, I took the care to mark “Cancel” as a localizable string)…- I never even though that anyone, other than Marcelo would have problems with that expression. Live and learn. I learned a lot about how not to build UI’s today…Edit: Since I was curious if “OK” was not used in French, (since larousse now seems to be paywalled) I took a look at https://www.dictionnaire-academie.fr/article/A9O0001-A
Fam. O.K. Prononciation : (se prononce oké), abréviation empruntée de l’américain, sans doute d’après all correct, et servant à acquiescer, à donner un consentement.P.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
Brian Masinick@Wallon again, you are correct that OK alone is insufficient; however, the language in the dialogue requesting either OK or Cancel should properly explain what you are either approving (OK) or canceling (Cancel).
As I articulated earlier, menu entries DO usually have either Quit or Exit, actions within an application typically have an OK or cancel – BUT – the OK or Cancel are (or should be) preceded by some text, (which CAN and SHOULD) be localized, explaining exactly what you are either giving the OK (approval) or Cancel (stopping or ceasing) to process. Does this help in the understanding?
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Brian MasinickBrian MasinickAs far as Apply versus OK, in these, the Apply means to add and activate some action, which may also include the application of some data or executable action to what is being applied.
OK, while similar, does not mean the same thing, it means approval, so typically where you see OK in a dialogue box, it means “I accept the action which is about to take place.
Conversely, Cancel means the same thing, either to an action or an activity; stop doing whatever you are doing, cancel the action and activity.
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Brian MasinickBrian MasinickThe reason you see a lot of OK, Apply and Cancel is that each of these is within an application.
When it’s a standard graphical utility, whether a Web browser, a text editor, or perhaps a file manager, the reason you don’t see OK, Apply, or Cancel in these is that none of them make sense in those cases, whereas Quit or Exit DO make sense for a Web Browser, File Manager, or Terminal Emulator; see the difference? There’s nothing to apply, you either start or stop those particular tools, so quit or exit are the two mechanisms for these, whereas applications that actually take action on information may want to Apply, confirm (OK), or Cancel their actions; this is why different applications use different words, and to me, as an American English speaking person (and a lot of the early UNIX commands and utility originally came from an American English speaking company, AT&T – and Linux, though a complete rewrite, is based upon the methods and techniques originally conceived of in an operating system designed and invented by Americans, and that is why the conventions (whether now developed or maintained in another country or not) still follow conventions, for better or for worse, invented in North America. All that said, OF COURSE countless improvements HAVE been made numerous times by people speaking other languages and a lot of language translation, localization, development and design have also been done elsewhere, yet in order not to alter conventions that have existed for 40-50 or more years, the current generation of systems follow those now dated traditions. Hope this historical addition is helpful; of course these things do not always have an optimal approach in other languages, which is why some more modern applications have a different approach, but again, this tends to increase confusion, so until something 100% different is designed and engineered, what we have is something that will never be ideal for everyone. A 100% redo of UNIX, Linux, or anything with a similar architecture is highly unlikely; a 100% redo of a 1000% better something is at least a decade overdue, but I guess the introduction of mobile devices, smartphones, etc. is what we have instead.
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Brian Masinickso typically where you see OK in a dialogue box, it means “I accept the action which is about to take place.
Conversely, Cancel means the same thing, either to an action or an activity; stop doing whatever you are doing, cancel the action and activity.
I agree completely. In this case, “Cancel” and “OK” come up on the context of what the window does. Case in point, Ad Block’s windows contents shows something like:
-Initial screen: that displays a warning message stating exactly what this app does and asks “Do you want to continue?” with 2 options “Cancel” and “OK”
-Main screen: Displays something like “Pick to be blocked”: (check box) “Block ad and malware websites” (…) and users have 3 final options:
To “cancel”; to disregard all block options and “Unblock everything”; to give their okay (to accept) what is picked to be blocked on the main upper part of the screen.
-Message boxes: all the user has to do is to accept the message that is displayed (either a message that states everything went fine according to user’s selection or an error message)On translating “OK”: I do agree with Marcelo in one thing: one should avoid using expressions in other languages, if our language does have an equivalent expression. In pt it’s common, on current, informal language to say “OK” to state our agreement with what’s being proposed. On multiple user interfaces, we just click “OK”.
As far as I researched, “OK” is also used in pt-br as a common way to state agreement with something… just not near where Marcelo lives (that’s why he considers it a “foreigner expression”, not pt-br. Despite that, I found that expression on a pt-br dictionary, and there’s even a Brazilian song with that expression on it’s title – but they do tend to overuse English expressions on their “modern” popular music, like “baby”, “love”, etc…). As far as I know, in pt-pt, “OK” is the single word with a “k” that we commonly use.I’ll keep an eye on this post, but probably I only waste more time on this matter.
P.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
- This reply was modified 1 week, 5 days ago by PPC.
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