On 2005-01-14 06:53:03 +0200, Tomi Junnila wrote:
> * Derek Martin <invalid@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote on 13.01.05 22:35:
> > > one, (2) as I've said, it isn't obvious that the alternative to
> > > postponing is discarding
> > My question is, again, what other sensible alternatives exist? You
> > see, I think it is obvious, on account that I can't imagine what else
> > could possibly follow. But I'm open to the possibility that I just
> > haven't thought of something sensible, even though it may exist...
>
> One possibility I could think of is to return to the compose screen.
That's done with Ctrl-G. This, however, is not obvious at all. You
either have to read the manual to know that pressing Ctrl-G cancels
(almost?) any operation, or you have to be told by some other mutt user
or find out by accident. Sure, once you know it it's nice: It is
consistent, you can use it everywhere, it doesn't take up screen space.
I agree that "postpone?" should not be a yes/no-question. If you answer
yes, the message will be postponed. But what happens if you say no? Will
the message be discarded? Will you be returned to the composition menu?
Will mutt start nethack? "No" can mean an infinite number of actions,
and people will differ in their assumption which one is the most
logical.
The actions should probably be explicitely spelt out:
P)ostpone Message, D)iscard message, R)eturn to menu?
or something like that.
> > clients. For example, IIRC if you click on the x button of a mozilla
> > mail composition window, the dialog box which pops up asks you
> > something like, "Do you want to save this message in the drafts
> > folder?" That's a longer way of asking, "Do you want to postpone this
> > message?"
>
> I'll have to admit to not having used Mozilla for mail, so I might be
> wrong here, but doesn't the dialog box actually have three options: Yes,
> No, and Cancel?
Actually, it's "Save", "Don't Save", and "Cancel". I think I also have
seen (maybe an older version of Mozilla or Firefox) "Save", "Discard"
and "Cancel" which is IMHO even clearer.
> In this case I don't see any confusion, as you have the extra option
> which implies that No and Cancel are two different things (one
> discards the message and the other returns to message composition).
It's pretty clear in this case, yes, although I have seen a few cases,
where it wasn't clear what "Cancel" would do (usually in response to
a cancel command: Does pressing "Cancel" now mean "Yes, I want to
cancel" or "No, I want to cancel the cancel"?)
hp
--
_ | Peter J. Holzer | If the code is old but the problem is new
|_|_) | Sysadmin WSR / LUGA | then the code probably isn't the problem.
| | | hjp@xxxxxxxxx |
__/ | http://www.hjp.at/ | -- Tim Bunce on dbi-users, 2004-11-05
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