GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 131615
[UI-REVIEW] keyboard model combo expanding size
Last modified: 2004-12-22 21:47:04 UTC
As discussed in the ui-review, the Core Layout Configuration tab has a 'Keyboard model' combox box that when opened expands the capplet beyond its original size, making it awkwardly large. There are three things that can be done here: 1) Prevent the combo box from expanding at all 2) Control the string size of the options (truncating them) 3) Use a new widget for choosing the model I recommend that a new widget be used as #1 may not be possible in a useful way and #2 is not a good idea as critical pieces of the strings may be stripped away if they are truncated. Perhaps a label with a chooser dialog? I'd argue that this is a 'one-time-setup' option which doesn't need a combobox. The combobox generally provides access for quick and often changing of options. The keyboard model is not changed quickly or often. So another system (that requires a few more clicks) could be used to choose from the list of available keyboard models. Either way, this should be fixed, if possible, before release. I'll attach the IRC Log of this discussion.
Created attachment 23411 [details] IRC Log of ui-review
I do not argue that current UI is shitty at this place. Actually, all the keyboard configuration in most cases is "one-time-setup" so it is not really clear why model choosing should be separate. Well, all my arguments are in IRC log. The maint point is that I do not see any real advantages of the separate popup solution over the current one (we would change one ugliness to another one). So I'd postpone changing things till we get _real_ solution. BTW, would it make sense to try new Gtk combo? Is it more flexible/smart in the resizing policy?
usability-maint, can you give any input here? Thanks.
Well, IMHO the problem isn't really so much with the choice of control, as with the way the control behaves: it forces the dialog to get wider as soon as the list is posted (presumably so that the option menu's 'hide me' button always remains visible), so even if you're selecting an item that's shorter than the current one, your dialog still gets a lot wider. I'd be tempted to call this a gtk+ bug-- does the option menu button always need to be visible? Couldn't the popup list just take up as much horizontal space as needed, overwriting the button if necessary? I guess the answer depends on how many people dismiss an option menu by clicking its button, rather than just re-selecting the current item, clicking outside or pressing Esc... Assuming that's not going to be addressed anytime soon, though, the only other suggestion I have at the moment is to put the option list on a row of its own, with its label above it. It arguably looks a bit odd, but if we move the Defaults button as well (and make up for the "applies to two tabs" oddities by adding some text), the expanding behaviour disappears altogether, at least for me. See attached glade file. (Note, I've also added a Defaults button to the Options tab here, so that would need to be hooked up in the code if we thought it was a good idea...)
Created attachment 23672 [details] Glade file to explain what I'm wittering on about
Fixed in a form of popup window.