[libreoffice-design] Minutes from the UX/design meeting 2023-Aug-08

[Eyal Rozenberg]

Come on, Heiko and Cor! Another example of not giving proper attention
to the discussion on the bug page.

On 08/08/2024 16:36, Heiko Tietze wrote:
>   * "Text direction" in page style dialog, with both Asian and RTL-CTL,
>      is inconsistent and confusing

you left out a key part of the title: "doesn't always set the actual
direction".

>      + https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=162200
>      + agree with Regina on keep status but write better help (Cor)
>      => WF
>   * Table > Properties > Text Flow > Text Orientation is misphrased and
> confusing
>     + https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=162201
>     + better "writing mode" (Regina)
>   => follow the expert's advice

First, let us return to a point that I thought was already settled:
Changes to help/documentation text are not a solution for problems with
the LibreOffice UI. If a control or a label is confusing or
inconsistent, that needs to be improved in the app itself, as best we
can; and whatever the UI has - the documentation is for elaboration in
greater detail, with more context and examples.

Second, we're past confusion or poor wording: We have "Text Direction"
control, which, for vertical writing modes - does not set the text
direction (!) and - there isn't another control in the dialog which sets
it, either. (For horizontal writing modes, the control does set the
direction.)

Finally - there are concrete suggestions for some improvements, and
they are not even all dependent on each other. The design meeting
minutes do not list any argument regarding why any of them are a bad
idea (and Regina's comments do not argue against these suggestions either).

Let me rephrase the suggested changes briefly, here:

* Split off writing mode control from direction control, using
consistent and clearly-phrased labels.

* Improve the preview graph to illustrate how lines look and progress.


Eyal



>
>   * STYLES pane -- duplicate style (an additional option beside the
> existing
>     new style from selection
>     + https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=162209
>     + WF'ed before on bug 152189
>     + duplication would be like new but on the same level in the hierarchy,
>       support the request (Cor)
>     => do it
>
>   * Terrible usability of AutoText dialog when creating new AutoText
>     + https://bugs.documentfoundation.org/show_bug.cgi?id=52607
>     + Source > Clipboard (added newly) should not be done as the AT
>       needs to be verified in the context (Cor)
>     + preview window: zoom slider for preview (Gerry)
>       + disagree; the actual issue should be fixed (Heiko)
>     + AutoText dialog should be amodal
>       + agreed (Cor, Heiko)
>     + does it make sense to modify the category while creating a new AT
> (Cor)
>       + we should carefully avoid mixing individual attributes from one AT
>         with information on the list of ATs such as categories and path;
>         therefore these are split out of the AT dialog/s (Heiko)
>     + is "Create AutoText out of selection" (directly) possible? (Gerry)
>       + requires a category and unless we just add all new content to
>         some "Standard" it needs this selection first (Heiko)
>     => wait for volunteers to implement
>