RE: Subject: RE: Open vs Appear, Yet Again (was: "RE: WG: Newbie question

[Beth Agnew <Beth -dot- Agnew -at- senecac -dot- on -dot- ca>]

The original problem was not the meaning of the word appear, nor the
connotation of it in everyday contexts. The reason its use was discouraged
was because at the time, personal computers were new on the scene and
connecting the working of a computer with terms that made it sound like
there was something unknowable going on was considered to be intimidating to
users.

It's a style issue, as are many of the debates we get into on this list.
Depressing buttons just makes me feel sad. :-)

-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+beth -dot- agnew=senecac -dot- on -dot- ca -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+beth -dot- agnew=senecac -dot- on -dot- ca -at- lists -dot- techwr-l -dot- com]On
Behalf Of Greg Holmes
Sent: Thursday, October 12, 2006 2:37 AM
To: TECHWR-L
Subject: Subject: RE: Open vs Appear, Yet Again (was: "RE: WG: Newbie
question


>Only in magic does something appear.

This chestnut must have been in a popular book or course somewhere ;)

Things appear all the time.  Products appear on the market.  New
talent appears on the scene.  And my wife appears whenever I'm about
to do something questionable, like sweep dust under the rug ...

>Quibble about it all that you
>want, but software doesn't show you anything. What it does,
>in the purest sense is modify the pixel display on the monitor,
>therefore, when you click on something, the computer or
>application displays the results of that function or process.

But we don't talk like that, do we?  Users drag something over
and drop it; they don't change the X and Y coordinates by depressing
the left mouse button while the mouse cursor is positioned over ...
well, not really "over" in two dimensions, but congruent with the icon
and with a higher Z-index ...    ;)  No, we say "drag the email to the
folder".

>From the user's point of view, a dialog box "appears".  It doesn't
slide in, fade in (well, these days it might ...), drop in from above,
or walk in.  It just appears, as a result of either their click or
some other instigation.

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