Ben Fowler wrote:
FWIW, I suspect that we may have to ask the parties who hold strong views, such as Alan, the Drivers such as Bulia and the Translators to give us pros and cons for two basic alternatives:
A. We agree that the present name "Effects" is wrong, but delivering Effects "On" in version 0.44 is so important that we will use this name (perhaps merely as a placeholder) and fix the UI in the next release.
B. We agree that a coherent UI is so important that we will leave Effects "Off" in version 0.44 and turn them on by default when the UI is fit for public use.
(Apologies if this offends anyone identifiable above, and apologies if I missed off the name of anyone whose name I should have included).
As for the matter discussed, having done some work on the Greek translation, I think that it's pretty late for any changes now. However, if we have reached consensus that the name is going to change for 0.44 the sooner it changes the better because it gives more time for localization teams.
In Greek language, this is not an issue, both names ("effect" and "effects") will get translated into the very same string. The word used is a non-Greek noun (don't frown upon this Alan, all menu names are nouns in Greek translations - I don't know why!), so its singular and plural forms are the same.
Personally, when looking at menus nouns came first to mind. But of course I am not a native English speaker so that may not be true for everyone. I tend to agree with Bulia that Effects is better because it refers to many things (hence the plural).
Whilst I do have a view on this, which I will state if asked, personally I feel that UI is very, very important for Inkscape and we should either a) 'get it right', b) make it plastic - modifiable in later versions or c) state clearly that it highly subject to change over the next 55 releases (which is what I mean by public use).
Your idea is a good one, and I would encourage you to provide it, but please note that a UI that needs to be set by the end user is not one I would propose unless your users are emacs/Lisp aficionados.
Ben.
I proposed this in order to better handle case (b). I didn't have a set-everything-up-yourself design in mind, but instead thought more of having presets for various UI styles (like Inkscape native UI (the current one), Corel Draw UI, Adobe Illustrator UI, etc.). And if a user doesn't like the name of something, he can change it as he sees fit.
In this way, the UI decisions could be assigned to a different team that would, for example, use feedback form usability evaluations or apply human-computer interaction guidelines to get a more user-friendly and consistent feel in menus, dialog boxes and status bar messages.
- Spyros Blanas