SUMMARY The same text will frequently appear 3+ times on the same settings window. For example, https://i.imgur.com/F4vXE6O.png "Application Style" appears four times. I can make excuses for three of them in this case, i.e. the window title definitely needs it, the "back" button is identifying which pane you're on, and in this case there's an "Application Style" sub-pane to the main "Application Style" pane. But the one that seems obviously redundant in every situation I've come across is the one in the largest font, just under the window title. I can't think of any good reason to show this, it doesn't resolve an ambiguity and (IMO) it's rather ugly. SOFTWARE/OS VERSIONS Linux: Arch Linux 5.9.0-arch1-1 KDE Plasma Version: 5.20.0 (no option for this in the version box yet) KDE Frameworks Version: 5.75.0 Qt Version: 5.15.1
Heh yeah.
Looking at the 5.21 beta release notes, it seems like this issue is not fixed. https://kde.org/announcements/plasma/5/20.90/kcm_access.png Has anyone from VDG had a chance to look at this? (Let me know if it's considered bad etiquette on this bug tracker to ping older issues that there's been no movement on, and I'll stop.)
No, as you can see, nobody has had time to look into this. :) Pinging for old bugs is generally considered unnecessary. If the bug isn't getting done, it means people are overloaded with other work that's considered higher priority. Perhaps you could look into it?
(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #3) > No, as you can see, nobody has had time to look into this. :) Pinging for > old bugs is generally considered unnecessary. If the bug isn't getting done, > it means people are overloaded with other work that's considered higher > priority. Perhaps you could look into it? Thanks, Nate. I'd be happy to look into improving this, but I was under the impression that things like this were in the domain of the VDG. In other words, don't I need to get a go-ahead from them before trying to change something like this? If not I'm happy to try submitting a patch.
Nope, go right ahead! We don't have a hierarchical or permission-based system here; you work on what you want and submit whatever proposed changes you want. That doesn't mean that they will necessarily be approved of course, but such is life. :) The real issue here is not so much technical, but rather design. We all know there is a problem here, but fixing it is tricky without radically, fundamentally changing the design or breaking edge cases that have gotten handled over the years.
Well, we're down to three now. :) Clearly we can't remove the name of the KCM from the list, so our only remaining options are to remove it from the titlebar, the header, or both. I think it's probably important to have it in at least one of those two places. Having the same title shown in both a list and also the view itself isn't uncommon at all and probably tolerable. :) So the question is, which one can we remove? If we remove the one in the titlebar and just make the window title always say, "System Settings", then we'll lose the ability to see the name of the active KCM in Task Manager items and tooltips. This is maybe not that big of a deal, but would technically be a feature regression. If we remove the the in the header, then we have a giant empty header area with nothing in it, which is pretty awkward-looking IMO. So I think we probably need to either remove the KCM name from the titlebar text, or else find a way to export the full title to the Task Manager, while only showing "System Settings" in the titlebar itself.
Created attachment 138630 [details] mockup screenshot
(In reply to Nate Graham from comment #6) > Well, we're down to three now. :) > > Clearly we can't remove the name of the KCM from the list, so our only > remaining options are to remove it from the titlebar, the header, or both. > > I think it's probably important to have it in at least one of those two > places. Having the same title shown in both a list and also the view itself > isn't uncommon at all and probably tolerable. :) > > So the question is, which one can we remove? > > If we remove the one in the titlebar and just make the window title always > say, "System Settings", then we'll lose the ability to see the name of the > active KCM in Task Manager items and tooltips. This is maybe not that big of > a deal, but would technically be a feature regression. > > If we remove the the in the header, then we have a giant empty header area > with nothing in it, which is pretty awkward-looking IMO. > > So I think we probably need to either remove the KCM name from the titlebar > text, or else find a way to export the full title to the Task Manager, while > only showing "System Settings" in the titlebar itself. I added a mockup in an attachment, it doesn't seem so bad to me. I don't mind the empty area so much. It would be fine if KCMs needed to be handled different when displayed outside the System Settings application, I think. An alternative is suggested by how the "Users" pane is currently handled. Here the header text doesn't just repeat "Users", it instead says something about the purpose of the KCM: "Manage Users". I don't know if it would be possible to do that for all of them, but maybe it's worth looking into. It's still possible to get more than three copies of a description on the screen at once, by the way. In fact it's now possible to get *five*. If you click "Shortcuts", you'll get it once in the first pane (where you selected it), once in the first header (to show that it's selected), once in the second pane (because the normal shortcuts are separated from custom shortcuts), once in the second header (to show that it's selected), and once in the window title. It's bad looking, or at least confusing, IMO.
You don't think the big empty area looks weird? I kinda think it looks weird. Yeah "Shortcuts" is bad though. Once we remove KHotkeys (aka "Custom Shortcuts") then we can collapse the group into being just one KCM and we'll be down to just three. But I get your point.
I'm pretty satisfied with the way this looks now in Plasma 6 - a lot more care has been taken in providing a proper system settings hierarchy and the labeling is less haphazard. If a KDE dev or someone in VDG disagree, feel free to re-open.