Author Topic: An indication for what will be applied when pressing 'Enter'  (Read 2967 times)

hiccup

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For any configuration panel, there is no indication of what will happen when you press 'Enter'.

Example; after having changed something in this panel, what will happen when you press [Enter]?
The panel will close, but has something been applied, were any edits saved or ignored? You'll have no idea.





This also raises a long-time itch of mine about the 'Apply', 'Save' and 'Close' buttons altogether.
Intuitively I would think just having 'Save and Exit' and 'Exit without saving' might be better candidates?
What would be the meaningful difference between having both an 'Apply' and a 'Save' button here?
Last Edit: January 05, 2020, 05:06:06 PM by hiccup

phred

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Example; after having changed something in this panel, what will happen when you press [Enter]?
The panel will close, but has something been applied, were any edits saved or ignored? You'll have no idea.
+1 Some sort of indication of changes to be applied would be helpful. And might even prevent some mistakes from being changed.

Quote
What would be the meaningful difference between having both an 'Apply' and a 'Save' button here?
I can't remember how MB works with this (I'm not at my MB PC) but often the developer allows clicking 'Apply' to errr, apply the changes -without- closing the window. Which allows the user to move to another tab/section/etc and continue making changes. 'Close' would not save any changes and close the window. 'Save' applies the changes and closes the window.

But yes, the results vary from application to application and like much in Windows, there is no set standard.
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hiccup

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I can't remember how MB works with this (I'm not at my MB PC) but often the developer allows clicking 'Apply' to errr, apply the changes -without- closing the window.

When back at your PC (it's feeling lonely and abandoned b.t.w.) you'll find that from the panel in the screenshot, 'Save' will not only do saving, but will also close the panel.
'Close' will also close the panel. But will that save the changes? It's not giving any indication.

phred

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When back at your PC (it's feeling lonely and abandoned b.t.w.) you'll find that from the panel in the screenshot, 'Save' will not only do saving, but will also close the panel.
'Close' will also close the panel. But will that save the changes? It's not giving any indication.
From my (rather depleted) memory, 'Close' does -not- save any changes. It simply closes. You can test that yourself. As will I when I get back to my lonely PC.
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psychoadept

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Apply/Save is a pretty common button combo in Windows apps, working exactly as here. Maybe they could have a tool tip to provide specifics of what will happen? Would "Close" be clearer if it said "Cancel"?
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hiccup

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From my (rather depleted) memory, 'Close' does -not- save any changes. It simply closes. You can test that yourself. As will I when I get back to my lonely PC.

Same as you, I have gotten accustomed to MB as some second skin over the years, and I will know what will probably happen when I hit a button.
But how would a newBee know what happens when he presses 'Close' or hits the [Enter] button?
And how could he guess or understand the difference (if it even exists) between 'Save' and 'Apply' ?
Last Edit: January 05, 2020, 05:44:20 PM by hiccup

phred

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Would "Close" be clearer if it said "Cancel"?
Absolutely yes!

But how would a newBee know what happens when he presses 'Close' or hits the [Enter] button?
And how could he guess or understand the difference (if it even exists) between 'Save' and 'Apply' ?
Unless the dialog follows Windows conventions, the new user wouldn't/couldn't know.

So perhaps "Save and Continue" "Save and Close" and "Cancel and Close" would be better.[/quote]
Last Edit: January 06, 2020, 01:22:58 AM by phred
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hiccup

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Would "Close" be clearer if it said "Cancel"?
Absolutely yes!

I don't understand why there would be three buttons to close a panel to begin with.

If you have made changes in a panel that you want to have applied you expect a button saying something like 'apply and close'.
If you just messed around and then changed your mind since you are not sure you know what you were doing, you want a button that implies 'forget about it, please close and don't tell anybody I even was here'.

So only two buttons indicating something like 'save and close' and 'ignore and close' would suffice?

frankz

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"Apply" is standard for applying whatever you've done but leaving the window open for further edits. 

Most programs that I use that have the "Apply" option have "OK" (to save and close) and "Cancel" (to cancel without applying changes) as the other two options. 

psychoadept

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I wouldn't want to lose the apply button. There are plenty of times when I want to save the changes I've made but I still have more stuff to mess with.
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Zak

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Changing the label on any of these buttons would be more confusing than what is currently implemented.

First, Close and Cancel do not mean the same thing.
Close means close this dialog box.
Cancel means close the dialog box and discard any of the changes I've made to it.

This means Apply and Cancel shouldn't appear on the same dialog, because what should happen if I make changes and click Apply and then click Cancel? Should the changes I made in the dialog box be undone even though I've already explicitly asked for them to be applied? That doesn't seem right.

Also, if you change a setting then click Close instead of Save, MusicBee will confirm if you meant to apply those changes:



Strangely, this isn't implemented for all settings though.


Second, the first response to this question gives a thorough argument for inclusion of the Apply button:

https://ux.stackexchange.com/questions/27781/when-to-include-an-apply-button

This seems especially applicable to a complex dialog like MusicBee's preferences.


Finally, to address the original post, the Save button should have a highlighted border, which is the Windows (and Mac and Linux and...) standard for the default button in a dialog box. Implementing that would be a better way to reduce confusion than deviating from well-established button labeling conventions.
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Bee-liever

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Finally, to address the original post, the Save button should have a highlighted border, which is the Windows (and Mac and Linux and...) standard for the default button in a dialog box. Implementing that would be a better way to reduce confusion than deviating from well-established button labeling conventions.

That's already available but it is skin specific:
<element id="Controls.Button.Highlight" bg="Main" fg="Contrast" bdr="Contrast+1" />
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boroda

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So perhaps "Save and Continue" "Save and Close" and "Cancel and Close" would be better.
[/quote]
this is the most common approach for windows apps, but buttons are usually named "Apply", "OK", "Cancel".

hiccup

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To be clear, there are two different 'issues' here that would be good to keep separated.


1. Indication of what button (function) gets triggered when pressing [Enter].

Most programs I know of highlight the button that will be triggered when you press [Enter]:



MusicBee does not indicate what will happen when you press [Enter] here:



(spoiler alert, it will save and close, no confirmation pop-up)


2. Wording of the buttons 'Apply', 'Save', 'Close'.

Taking things very literally, wordings such as:

'Apply' doesn't say if it will leave the panel open, or close it while saving your changes.
'Save' doesn't say it will also close.
'Close' doesn't say if it will 'cancel and close' or 'save and close'.
(there can appear a confirmation pop-up afterwards, but the button itself doesn't clarify)


I don't believe the above issues are actually very problematic, and also I can't recall anybody else ever having mentioned something about this over all these years.
It's just something I observe and thought to throw in for some friendly discussion.

The argument I would make myself if I wanted to defend the current situation is that I do like the clean and uncluttered look of things.



edit:

I notice some other software (like two from the screenshot) have 'Apply' greyed out. That makes a lot of sense for when you opened a panel and haven't yet changed anything.
So perhaps some dynamic 'intelligence' added to these buttons could be a sensible improvement?
Maybe something like when you have changed a setting, 'Apply' gets 'un-greyed-out'™, and a 'Cancel' button appears?
Last Edit: January 14, 2020, 04:03:15 PM by hiccup

phred

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I notice some other software (like two from the screenshot) have 'Apply' greyed out. That makes a lot of sense for when you opened a panel and haven't yet changed anything.
So perhaps some dynamic 'intelligence' added to these buttons could be a sensible improvement?
Maybe something like when you have changed a setting, 'Apply' gets 'un-greyed-out'™, and a 'Cancel' button appears?
Yes, yes, and yes!
In other words, +1, +1, +1
This is keeping with (most) Windows conventions.
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