[fpc-pascal] SysLocale.PriLangID vs Mac OS X localization

[Jonas Maebe]

On 23 Jun 2008, at 18:00, Michael Van Canneyt wrote:

> On Mon, 23 Jun 2008, Jonas Maebe wrote:
>
>> On 23 Jun 2008, at 10:41, Bent Normann Olsen wrote:
>>
>>> Yup, I know, but it's a 1-1 port from Win32 to Mac,
>>
>> That's really a very bad idea, unless you are only interested in  
>> supporting
>> Windows users switching to a Mac (although even for them the  
>> application will
>> feel weird after a while).
>
> So what do Mac users do with all these web-applications and "web  
> 2.0" with
> their other GUI rules ?

Is it really that hard to imagine that an application which uses the  
conventions of a different platform is unnecessarily hard and annoying  
to use? For example,
* if it uses different shortcut keys compared to all other  
applications (both for menus and/or for text editing)
* if it has various menu items in different menus than you'd expect
* if it puts all buttons in dialog windows in the opposite order and  
in different places compared to other applications so you intuitively  
click the wrong button half of the time
* if it does not honour your system settings and requires you to  
reenter a bunch of globally available information used by other  
applications again in its own preferences
* if it quits when you close its last window while virtually every  
other application stays open (apart from simple utility apps)
* if it puts up modal dialog boxes all the time which block the entire  
application instead of just the document the dialog box pertains to  
like other apps
* if it implements dialog boxes like a font chooser or colour picker  
in its own way rather than using the default system ones you are used  
to from all other apps
* if it insists on putting its shared libraries in global system/user  
locations so they can interfere with other apps
* if it insists on spreading files all over the system instead of  
grouping all these files in a single bundle so that an uninstall  
operation requires an uninstaller or manual fiddling rather than just  
"delete the bundle" like most other apps
* if it puts its preferences file in a non-standard location
* if it requires you to click "apply" buttons all the time in dialog  
windows while virtually no other application has them (except if the  
setting causes state changes which are not easily undoable)
* if it looks completely different from other applications so instead  
of basically ignoring the looks and just focussing on the  
functionality, your attention is diverted because it does not look  
like what you are used to
...

If you have the choice between such an application and one which looks  
and behaves as you've come to expect from other applications, what  
would you choose? It's not about what is better or worse (nor about  
Mac vs Windows vs Linux users), but simply about what you expect and  
are used to from other applications running on the same system. It's  
just as bad when trying to force Mac UI paradigms on Windows users  
(like Apple does with Quicktime Player and iTunes, although they have  
made them slightly more consistent with common Windows UI behaviour  
over time after harsh criticism on the initial releases).


Jonas