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From: stui@avalon.caladan.wa.com (Stuart Burden)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.programmer
Subject: Re: removing balloon help....
Message-ID: <1CE00001.h1mowr@avalon.caladan.wa.com>
Date: 14 Jun 91 06:35:50 GMT
Reply-To: stui@avalon.caladan.wa.com (Stuart Burden)
Organization: Avalon, beyond the Mists
Lines: 69
X-Mailer: uAccess - Mac Release: 1.5

In article <14058@goofy.Apple.COM>, lsr@Apple.COM (Larry Rosenstein) writes:
  | away by itself if other menus need that space.  As for menu bar clocks, if
  | menu bar space is so tight on a small screen, then one wouldn't want to use
  | a menu bar clock at all.

This is not so.  One has the choice of then choosing the function
of greatest utility to them.. in my case (and it seems in many others
also) this is a clock.  Perhaps Apple would have been better off,
chucking the da clock (does anyone "really" use this), and adding
a very popular item, a menubar clock, to System 7! :-)  Seems like
this would have been a very popular option! :-)

  | Developers are encouraged to put their own help items there (rather than in
  | the Apple menu, or in a hierarchical menu, or in the about box, or ...).
  | The Finder does this already.  You would lose access to these items without
  | the help menu.

The only thing that we currently lose, is the "promise" that everyone
will do this "in the future".  Well that's all well and wonderful,
but I still don't understand why there is not an option for turning
this excess use of menubar space, off.  Consistancy can still be maintained
with the addition of a single option.  I don't see that providing
a single (and seemingly popular) option, will cause the entire fabric
of the Apple usability universe to rip into shreds.  If so then it
is truely built on shaky ground.. and perhaps that is the case with
Balloon help, which has already received reviews saying: cute, wish
you could turn it off, first time users might use it for awhile etc
etc.

Now in practice a user will use an applications menu's constantly, that's
why developers place the important options on the menubar.  How often
do users use help?  Most companies of any repute have dedicated a
great deal of research to this, and I think you will find that interactive
Computer Based Training aids are more highly regarded than something
that pops up cartoon balloons.. really.

One thing that Apple could have done well to consider, would have
been the use of a Windows menu, and on the Windows menu, place the
standard Balloon help items (at the bottom :-))... there is something
to be said for this functionality in MS-Windows!

Now several questions have been asked as to why one would prefer to
see a clock rather than a neat.. cool.. question mark (:-^)) on the
menubar.. it still comes down to what will you use.  Balloon help
is a nice touch, no doubt about it.  But it will not be used.. really
used like a menu item should be.  Is it "really" that important that
is "should" be on it's own menu (really.. think about it.. how many
times will a user turn on Balloon help to see a balloon that tells
them that the File menu contains Print and File items.. sheesh.. once..
maybe twice if they are really desperate).

A menubar clock.. heck that gets used ALL the (pardon the pun) "time".

A Windows menu, I'd use all the time :-)

Cheers.

Stu.

PS.  Now seriously, I don't expect Apple to add an option to turn
off Balloon help.. as this would signal to developers, that this is
actually an option that users "could possibly live without" (what
a concept :-)), and at the moment with Balloon Help barely in it's
infancy, that'd be the last thing they would want.  So beat us over
the head with it, they will.

--
stui@avalon.uucp
stui@avalon.caladan.wa.com