The top right on/off button

[Tom Davies]

Hi :)

Windows called it a "Start" button and added the equivalents of the full 
Applications, System and Places menu all wrapped up in it.  Since you couldn't 
click on it when the machine was off the only thing it couldn't do was/is start 
the machine! Well, perhaps not the onlything as it couldn't do the washing 
either.

The Control Panel/Centre (as seen in Mageia/Mandriva i think & Wolvix and 
others) would seem to make more sense in the System menu but perhaps it's  on 
the Start button so that people see it.  "System" sounds scary.

Regards from
Tom :)




________________________________
From: Jim Campbell <jwcampbell at gmail.com>
To: Gunnar Hjalmarsson <ubuntu at gunnar.cc>
Cc: ubuntu-doc at lists.ubuntu.com
Sent: Mon, 18 April, 2011 18:05:55
Subject: Re: The top right on/off button

Hi  Gunnar,


On Mon, Apr 18, 2011 at 11:52 AM, Gunnar Hjalmarsson <ubuntu at gunnar.cc> wrote:

On 2011-04-18 12:16, Tom Davies wrote:
>> On 2011-04-18 02:16, Gunnar Hjalmarsson wrote:
>>> ... we are talking about the icon with the symbol (circel and
>
>>> vertical bar) that usually stands for switching on or off
>>> something.
>>
>
>> Hmmm, as you say most electrical appliances use that symbol on their
>> on/off button so i think we should call it that.  The session
>> manager stuff are just variants on the on/off idea.  People switch
>> off one user and switch on the other.  Ok, that is a bit of a stretch
>> but i think it's more intuitive just to give it a generic name that
>> non-computer users will recognise.
>
>Maybe. I for one would be more inclined to agree if it hadn't been for
>the new "System Settings" menu item. Suggesting that users click the
>"on/off button" or "on/off icon" when guiding them to a launcher in the
>"Control Center" does not feel right to me.
>
>Anyway, if it's decided on a distinct term to refer to the thing, I
>suppose it should be included at ghelp:gnome-help#shell-terminology.
>Btw, the current "System settings" explanation on the terminology page
>is one example where "click your name" needs to be replaced with
>something else.
>

Yes, I'm working on this. Per the ayatana folks, it is called the Session menu. 
I guess it was more appropriate to call it that before they added the System 
Settings menu to the bottom.

I've removed the "click your name" text, as well as the calendar text on the 
unity-introduction page. I've committed it locally, and should get through the 
intro sections today. 


Then we will be mostly unity-focused. Yeay.  : )
 

>Without knowing anything about the considerations behind the decision to
>include "System Settings" in the session menu, it was a disputable
>decision IMHO. Accordingly I for one consider this to really be a design
>issue, and I can't see that it's possible to deal with it in the docs in
>a perfect way. Let's just do the best of it for now.
>

I agree. The interface might not be perfect, so we just need to help users with 
knowing where to find stuff.
 

>Another thought that comes up in my head is that while a sensible and
>consistent terminology is crucial in reference docs, it's not that
>important in user docs. I mean, can we really expect the target audience
>of the user docs to go to a terminology page to be able to understand
>the docs? Probably not.
>

If we include the terms + a few screenshots as part of the intro sections (the 
mouse-over stuff . . . ), I think that will be helpful.

 

>>> Considering which items the menu currently show, I suppose that the
>>> icon should better be replaced.
>>
>> I do really think we should keep the icon.  It is identical to the
>> symbol used on most appliances that people are familiar with.
>
>Ok. As you understand from what I wrote above, it doesn't matter much to
>me. ;-)
>
>
>

Thanks, Gunnar!

Jim 
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