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Systemsettings
by liquidat on Wednesday 04/Jul/2007, @16:26

I wonder what the reasons are behind replacing kcontrol with Systemsettings.
While it doesn't matter for me I'm pretty sure that others had some thoughts about it.

Is Systemsettings easier to maintain? Or does it fit better to HIGs? Or does it offer more options? And if yes, which?

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Re: Systemsettings
by Emil Sedgh on Wednesday 04/Jul/2007, @16:44

There was a long thread on KDE-core-Devel Mailing list about this...
It looks like that People like it better than KControl.

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Re: Systemsettings
by Jucato on Wednesday 04/Jul/2007, @17:03

Although a probably bigger motivation is that KControl is unmaintained and broken for KDE 4, while System Settings is actively being worked on has started to be ported to KDE 4.

Of course, some people liked it better, and some didn't. :)

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Re: Systemsettings
by liquidat on Wednesday 04/Jul/2007, @17:47

Thanks for the info - the discussion can be seen here:
http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-core-devel&m=118185759614117&w=2

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Re: Systemsettings
by Simon on Thursday 05/Jul/2007, @01:58

Systemsettings - this is the one that Kubuntu currently uses, is that correct? It took a bit of getting used to after years of KControl for me but I can see that it is probably better for someone coming to it new. Also, there are the other reasons as discussed on the mailig list

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Re: Systemsettings
by Simon on Thursday 05/Jul/2007, @02:00

Ah, just read your blog post Liquidat, which answers my question

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Re: Systemsettings
by Erunno on Thursday 05/Jul/2007, @10:03

Someone over at the ubuntuforums.org raised some good points where System Settings is inferior to KControl Since I generally agree I'll just paste them here:

1) KControl displays widgets much better in any screen size. System settings responds to a smaller screen size by always adding scrollbars, instead of resizing the widgets. (see Screenshot #1 style.png). This even happens on my relatively large 1280x800 display, so it certainly isn't good on even smaller displays.(see screenshot #2 size.png).

2) KControl has a much more intuitive way of managing oversized modules. It places the module within a scroll bar, but places the Apply/Cancel buttons outside, ensuring that they are always available. This is much smarter than system settings, which scrolls everything including the buttons(see screenshot #3 search.png).

3) While System Settings has a decent search function, which tells you which categories the results are in, the Kcontrol one is a lot better. It allows you to load several modules to see which result you want, while keeping the search results active. While system settings can do this, you need to go back and forth to achieve the same result.

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Re: Systemsettings
by ac6 on Friday 06/Jul/2007, @02:28

Yep, and systemsettings isn't controllable by keyboard (you need the mouse).

But I think (hope) that now it is in the KDE svn those issues will be solved because usually KDE software is of very high quality also in regard to keyboard control (unlike unfortunately the software added to kubuntu which is not in default KDE).

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Re: Systemsettings
by jospoortvliet on Monday 09/Jul/2007, @07:44

Actually, the keyboard issue is already solved, and work is going on on the size-thingy.

The search interface might improve as well, though the way Kcontrol vs systemsettings are makes it impossible (I think) to really do it the Kcontrol way.

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Re: Systemsettings
by jame on Monday 30/Jul/2007, @21:06

I didn't code any of this or greatly follow it's creation, but my interpretation is that the System Settings changes were motivated by a very rare situation. That being: usability is not the primary concern of a computer settings editor, discoverability is.

High usability apps are usually somewhat difficult to learn (look at any professional tool and how many shortcuts it has that aren't obvious, most of the Adobe suite comes to mind). The general settings for a desktop are very rarely edited, so having it not done in the exact minimum time-frame is not a large overall penalty.

In real use, a settings editor is only used periodically and often when it is being used it is being used by a first-time user, or at least by a user who has never done what he is looking to do before. You usually only have to touch a specific setting once or twice before it's right, not every few days.

Because of this, a 'well designed' settings editor might be a little cumbersome to an experienced user, because the improvements to discoverability slow them down. I think that's the main reason that, when the interface is improved overall, this particular tool can take what many see as a back-step.

So, keep in mind not only how much the changes effect you, and also how much the changes will affect inexperienced users, as they're the ones most affected by the interface of this module.

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