Regaining "Control Centre"

[Ari Torhamo]

On ti, 2007-02-27 at 21:55 +0000, Gabriel Dragffy wrote:
> Vincent Trouilliez wrote:
> > Gabriel Dragffy <dragffy at yandex.ru> wrote:
> >> Somehow I lost Control Centre from System and it had instead returned to 
> >> the old form of Admin+Prefs. Any one able to tell me how to get back to 
> >> the lovely feisty look using the Control Centre?
> > 
> > Just open the menu editor to enable it (and disable the Pref and Admin
> > menus if you like).
> > 
> > --
> > Vince
> > 
> 
> So simple!! Worked a treat!
> And you know... I never used that before, hence my unfamiliarity. Thanks 
> for that.


In my view abandoning the control centre would be a step back for less
experienced users. They tend to find large menus overwhelming. When the
items are presented on a window instead of a menu, it's easier to take
your time and look at what's available without accidentally moving the
cursor and having the menu disappear.

Inexperienced users also are not familiar with the administrative tools
and settings available. They often choose wrong a few times before they
find what they need, so they need to go to the panel and click there way
to the menu items after every wrong selection. Because there's little
grouping and organization on the menus, people forget which items they
already tried, or even which menu they were on last time they tried, and
may end up jumping between menus and menu items and clicking
half-randomly. On a window the items are organized two-dimensionally and
grouped, which helps in creating a mental map for orientation. The
icons, which help in identifying and remembering different items, are
also larger in the control centre.

I was happy to see the control center come and disappointed to see it
go. On the other hand I'm glad that those who prefer the menus can have
their way. My suggestion would be to make the control centre the
default, and add a selection to enable the menus. It's more natural for
the experienced users to adjust there environment to their liking. Why
wouldn't we give a friendly default for the inexperienced.

I admit that I like the control center myself too - even though I'm not
so inexperienced. The menus are OK, but especially when I want to change
many settings, like with a new installation, I find the control centre
more comfortable.


Regards,

Ari Torhamo