Feature request: consistence of colour dialogues

[skiwi]

PS when are we going to be allowed to upload images directly instead of having to go to twice the effort.


When setting the colour of an object (say the border color) in a diagram the dialogue box shown is


When setting the colour of a connector in a diagram the dialogue box shown is


A different range of different colours is shown.

This makes it hard in some cases to choose the same colour,
and I wonder why there isn't consistency,
such that all colour dialogues are the same (reuse!)

[Thelonius]

Good point, Skiwi. I've noticed this too.

Reason probably is there were 2 different people programming these two functions.

[«Midnight»]

Yep.

[skiwi]

And another colour dialogue (setting text colour for classes and connectors)

[skiwi]

And another one
(setting text colour in notes)


Also used in RTF editor for text and background colour.

[skiwi]

The RTF editor uses the same dialogue box for font and background colour, but, wait there's more, a different one for underline colour.


Please note I have submitted a feature request for this to be tidied up.

[skiwi]

Sorry, there is another one

Try Shape | Appearance | Use Default Colour



Thanks to 'you know who you are' for this one.

[skiwi]

As at version 8.0.857 there is no sign of movement on this one.

[Thelonius]

And ... no indication of professional courtesy or 'customer centred' product strategic thinking directed toward the good people who pay for their licenses.

As in 'We acknowledge your concerns and we intend to do something about it in release n.n'.

Wouldn't that be nice.

I don't mind the god-awful inconsistency of presentation and function as much as I mind the lack of concern with customer communication.

[skiwi]

I have submitted that as a bug request under the title
"Feature request: consistence of colour dialogues"

I don't think I did so before.

Simon

[mrf]

The second and third last picture show the same dialog, just that the second last one has the Define Custom Colors section expanded.

In the last picture, clicking the select button would take you to that same dialog (RGB fields were provided at that dialog level to save you one more level of dialog).

The 4th last dialog is the standard Windows font chooser dialog (provided by common controls). Please note that the color dialog (the other 3 dialog instances) is also a standard Windows dialog. So if there is an inconsistency then it is across Windows as a whole. I do not have a say in the usage of these dialogs, but if it were up to me, I'd certainly prefer to use the standard Windows dialogs ahead of custom ones as that is what the wider user base is familiar with.

The other two (context menu/combo box related color choosers) I'd have to have a little bit more of a look into - so your issue report will lend weight to that.

[beginner]

So you're trying to tell us that we users are just too dumb to see that these dialogues are all the same. And if not so it was Windoze standard?

b.

[mrf]

No beginner, I don't believe I questioned anyone's intelligence in my post, I just pointed out that two of the dialogs were the same in case that was overlooked.

I do not deny that the standard font and the standard color dialog choosers are different, but they're standard dialogs across the Windows platform. The moment we go straying from that we'll be lined up by the other 90% of the user base because we went against the platform standard.

[skiwi]

The second and third last picture show the same dialog, just that the second last one has the Define Custom Colors section expanded.

You are correct, however if in the RTF editor you select the context menu, then Font, you get the following results for
Text colour ...    opens unexpanded dialogue
Background colour ... opens unexpanded dialogue
Underline colour ... opens expanded dialogue <--- why?

If you open Paragraph, you get the result for
Background colour ... opens expanded colour dialogue <--- why?

If you open Table, you get the results for
Cell border colour ... opens expanded dialogue <--- why?
Cell colour ... opens expanded dialogue <--- why?

In the last picture, clicking the select button would take you to that same dialog (RGB fields were provided at that dialog level to save you one more level of dialog).

This is true, but I would question the actual utility of this, versus the confusion of a different dialogue, and ''having'' to know that the select button takes you to the colour dialogue.

The 4th last dialog is the standard Windows font chooser dialog (provided by common controls). Please note that the color dialog (the other 3 dialog instances) is also a standard Windows dialog. So if there is an inconsistency then it is across Windows as a whole. I do not have a say in the usage of these dialogs, but if it were up to me, I'd certainly prefer to use the standard Windows dialogs ahead of custom ones as that is what the wider user base is familiar with.

You may be right about the windows dialogue, but when I use word all the dialogues appear the same, no matter what item I am formatting.

The other two (context menu/combo box related color choosers) I'd have to have a little bit more of a look into - so your issue report will lend weight to that.

Thanks

IMHO a consistent user interface is preferable, and in the case where dialogues are on a diagram and perhaps can be justified as being different they should at least show the same default colours, and provide the option to proceed to the standard dialogue box.

[skiwi]

One change by build 922.