Craig Box's journeys, stories and notes...


Posts Tagged ‘usability’

For the people who want to make HIGification a word

Tuesday, June 20th, 2006

A Firefox bug I haven't raised yet:

File menu should be renamed Page menu

Applications traditionally have a File menu, as the far left menu in their menu bar. Applications also traditionally act on "files" of some sort, be it documents, images, locally on your disk.Most of the things in the File menu in Firefox are actions that can be performed on the web page or image you are currently viewing (save, print, send, etc). While these technically are files, perhaps it might be worthwhile considering renaming the menu "Page".

I can't see Windows human interface guidelines without buying a book from 1998, which is made redundant by every new Windows (and also by every new Office, even if they come at the same time!). The GNOME HIG suggests that if you're a game, you should use a Game menu, not a File menu, and the Apple HIG says you don't have to have a File menu, just an Apple menu and an application menu. So why not give it a go?

I haven't raised this bug, but I'm interested in doing so if it seems like a good idea (This suggestion bought to you in part by IE7. It's Page menu isn't even on a menu bar any more).

By the way, I didn't know we were Planet Poetry Wink