Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!mattd
From: mattd@Apple.COM (Matt Deatherage)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple
Subject: Re: Menus in NDA windows
Message-ID: <37175@apple.Apple.COM>
Date: 10 Dec 89 19:15:54 GMT
References: <13980.chatter.infoapple@pro-beagle>
Organization: Apple Computer Inc, Cupertino, CA
Lines: 48

In article <13980.chatter.infoapple@pro-beagle> mmunz@pro-beagle.cts.COM (Mark Munz) writes:
>
>Sorry, I just had to laugh.  If you look over on the Macintosh side
>of the world, you'll find that menus that are attached to Window Title
>bars are quite common. (MicroSoft's Word has buttons and pull down 
>menus all over the place, including the Ruler)
>
Word's menus are this bizarre combination of pull-downs and pop-ups.  The
menu pulls down (or "pops down") from a fixed location, but it doesn't have
a menu title - it pulls down from a box that contains the last selection, just
like a pop-up's box contains.  I find it weird.

>While it is good to try and conform to the Apple Interface, let us
>not forget that it too is not perfect, and must evolve.  And unless
>you're willing to let Apple control the Interface guidelines completely,
>I say keep experimenting.  When folks don't like the interface, they
>say so, and the author either lives with bad press or makes it better.
>
>--Mark Munz

Right.  Apple can't possibly anticipate all the user interface needs unless
Apple were writing all the software, which it's not.  However, Apple does ask
that if you have to do something really strange that you write in through
AppleLink (DTS can help you find the right places) and *ask* for help so that
you do what you do consistently with the rest of the desktop, and so that
perhaps other programs can use the new mechanism in the future as part of the
interface.  For example, those who had to put up a modal dialog (requiring
action before the program can proceed) but had to do so in a movable window
so other parts of the desktop could be seen had a problem.  Those who didn't
ask for help made regular looking windows that couldn't be put behind other
windows and in general didn't behave like a window should.  Those who did
ask for help got a new "movable modal dialog" definition, with a new Macintosh
WDEF already available on AppleLink (we're working on the IIgs version).

The interface is a living thing, and Apple's not the only one that can help
it grow.  Apple just referees and keeps the standards.



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