Re: [RFH] QGit: how to cram a patch in a crowded screen

From: Pavel Roskin <proski@gnu.org>
Date: May 31, 2007, 00:23 UTC
Message-ID: <1180571013.3582.32.camel@dv>
In-Reply-To: <e5bfff550705301118k4ca8720bna260e171f0eb83ca@mail.gmail.com>

On Wed, 2007-05-30 at 21:18 +0300, Marco Costalba wrote:

> My (crazy) idea is:
> 
> - Let switch from message to diff content scrolling down after the end
> of message.

...

I'll appreciate if you follow standard conventions for standard GUI actions and don't change the behavior of such basic keys as arrows.

It would be better to use something more advanced for application specific behavior. I belong to the post-vi generation, so my mind cannot easily associate letters (like 'i' and 'k') with up and down actions. But we could use some key combinations with obvious "directional meaning", such as Ctrl-arrows.

I've said it before, and it's worth repeating - any key must be discoverable through the GUI. No key or feature should be discovered by accident - it would be a sign of bad design.

> So I imagine two labels for each content type:
> 
> - for message content a top right label called "Up" and one in bottom
> right position called "Diff"

...

> I plan also to change the labels in something more intuitive with
> scroll action, as example adding an up and down direction little
> arrows next to them.

I'm afraid it would misuse the paradigm of labels. It should be buttons, perhaps in the toolbar.

> P.S: In case someone wonders what's the goal of this label madness. It
> is to be able to browse a repo in either both sequential directions,
> up or down, using only the mouse wheel.

It may be a cool feature, but users don't expect the mouse wheel to change anything other than position of the text. Switching the revision by the scrolling the wheel would be a feature discovered by accident.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin