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Subject:Re: Style Guidelines for pull-down menus From:Mike Stockman <stockman -at- JAGUNET -dot- COM> Date:Fri, 6 Aug 1999 11:33:58 -0400
On 8/6/1999 10:36 AM, Olive, Eric (EOlive -at- GLHEC -dot- ORG) wrote:
>As Sean Brierley suggested yesterday in response to a similar question, why
>not keep it simple?
>
>Choose Search>Search Menu Option.
I find that not all novice users know what that ">" contruction means. In
fact, I find that novice users are often confused by submenus in general.
I'll admit I don't know a good way to tell a user to choose a command
(not an item, or option) from a submenu, except to say:
1) Choose the New command from the File menu, then choose Document from
the submenu that appears.
It's explicit for novice users, and expert users can skim to find the
command names they want, as long as the structure is used consistently.
I've gotten good responses for this structure from readers, although I
think it's still imperfect (kind o' wordy).
>As for standards, the previous responses to your post are on the mark;
there
>is not standard. Some prefer choose, others select. MS uses click. I prefer
>choose because it clearly distinguishes pull-down/drop-down menus from
items
>one selects in a list box and buttons one clicks in a dialog box.
I always use choose for menu commands (not options or items) because they
may use the mouse, or a pen, or a touchscreen, or the keyboard, and only
the first one (granted, the most common) actually consists of a "click."
It's the same reasoning for telling users to "enter" information into a
field rather than "type" it, since you don't know how the user will get
the information there, and it really doesn't matter.
I do think it's bizarre that Apple, whose OS doesn't support using the
keyboard to choose all menu commands (only the ones with assigned
shortcuts) recommends "Choose," while Microsoft, whose OS supports full
keyboard control of the menu bar, recommends "Click."
