Difference between revisions of "User Experience/Improving OOo Default Settings"

Revision as of 17:20, 8 April 2010

Renaissance Subproject to Achieve Better Default Settings

Executive summary: Please locate your favorite low hanging fruits by _end of April_ to improve default settings in Impress (or all apps for later, but the lmpress focus is till end of April)

"Better Defaults", as this effort is called for short, aims to collect suggestions for better default settings in OOo. First in Impress (in accordance with the present focus of project Renaissance) and later in the other OOo applications. This is a subproject of Project Renaissance, so it is listed on the "Current Work" wiki page .

What does "better defaults" mean? Well, I KNOW there are default settings that you change first thing when you install a new version of OOo. So please share what they are and why the change(s) make(s) your life much easier. 

For example, two issues Frank found are:

Make objects same size Issue 54281

Text area selection is not very accurate and covers other objects. Issue 96548

One default setting changed recently was Issue 2446 Boy did that feel good! Let's find more of those.

Low Hanging Fruit Clause

No new features. The developer should only have to flip a switch on something that is already alive and kicking in the office suite, but just not set as the default. We want results, so the low hanging fruits are the ones we want to grab.

How to Get Started

Find existing default setting issues or write new RFEs in IssueTracker (use "default" in the title and keyword) and add them to list in the table on this wiki page.
Or, if RFE writing is not your kind of thing, just write your desires to achieve default utopia ;-) in the table below. Be sure to make it clear where the feature is located (write down where to click to get there) and why it is better to set the default the way you want it as compared to the old setting.

If you have a complex issue or several defaults in the same area, it would be best if you create an individual wiki page (put link to it in the table below) for all the related defaults like Chris did (see Grid Handling.) Each individual default setting being suggested can then be discussed on the respective wiki pages, just like the discussion in the table at the bottom of the Grind Handling wiki page. That information will serve as the basis for decision making when it comes to evaluation time, because the iTeam will have the discussion and details all in one place (wiki page) and not jumbled all over the mailing lists.

Time Frame

Please get your 2cents in by the END of APRIL (for Impress). Then the iTeam can evaluate the suggestions and decide what to implement with the resources they have. The other application will follow within the scop of the Renaissance project.

List of Better Default Setting Suggestions

Idea	Application	Description	Name
Rotation Mode, Guides when Moving on	Impress	'Rotation Mode after Clicking Object' & 'Guides When Moving' are two feature options which are switched off by default => they should be switched on by default (more info: Grid Handling).	Clu
Change Handle Size	Draw/Impress	The current handle size was defined years ago - with displays offering less density than today. I propose to change the default handle size to "large". This option can be found in the toolbar "Options" (more info: Grid Handling).	ChristophNoack
bullet point lists	Impress	Bad standard defaults of bullet point lists. If one creates a text frame in Impress and clicks on the button "numbering and bullet points" (Nummerierung und Aufzählungszeichen), the newly created bullet point list has terrible standard defaults: (1) Almost no space between the bullet point and the text. (2) No ident for the second line of text under a bullet point. The second line appears left-justified directly under the bullet point. Instead, there should be a ident of the second line. It should begin exactly there where the first letter in the first line starts.	Gerald
default colour of drawing objects	Draw/Impress	Issue 93507	Gerald
'Right page' should be next style to 'Left page'	Writer	Issue 15498	Name
Ugly style sheets for headings in Writer	Writer	I used Writer for several articles, publications, flyers and in all of them the standard headings look ugly and outdated. Any designer would not choose these style sheets for Heading 1-10. Furthermore, in this regard the competition has made large steps forward during the last release cycles.	Gerald
'Right page' should be next style to 'Left page'	Writer	Issue 15498	Name
Make manual page break in Writer better visiable	Writer	for example use 'light blue' and a thicker line. Issue 33518 and duplicates Issue 65150 , Issue 82353 , Issue 96963 , Issue 22646	Name
Default line too thick	Chart	especially XY-Charts need hairline lines.Issue 98803	Name
Idea	Draw	Include toolboxes circles, rectangles, text instead of single symbol in drawing toolbar. Reasoning: (1) The 'circles and ovals' and the 'text' toolbox is not accessible via View - Toolbars in Draw. So currently the only way to access arcs and legends is to customize the drawing toolbar. (2) Draw is used for technical constructions and there those objects are often used, in contrast to Writer or Impress, where drawing objects are used for illustrations in most cases. (3) Using the toolboxes needs no more space than single objects and give you a quick access too, because the last used object remains above for single click.	Regina
Add Math formula icon to standard bar	All	Math objects are often used in technical documents. You need the way Insert - Object - Formula to insert one. That is too long. For example consider writing a math text for school, which has about twenty formulas per page usually.	Regina
Distance in numbering styles larger	Writer	Make the distance from number to text in numbering styles larger, so that 10. text is still in line.	Regina
Add a gap in table of contents	Writer	Add a gap (tab or space) between number and text in table of contents in Writer. The picture shows the ugly default settings. Notice the missing space between number and heading text.	Regina
Use parallel perspective for 3D-scene	Draw	3D-scenes in Draw are to illustrate constructions. Often several 3D-objects are combined in one scene. Working with several objects is faulty if perspective is on. So the first step when working with 3D-objects is to switch to parallel projection. It is "faulty" because it is unhandy to arrange or rotate objects inside a scene when in central perspective and because of Issue 67847 .	Regina
Set margins in style of Math formula objects to 0cm	Writer	Set margins in style of Math formula objects in Writer to 0cm. Issue 22136	Regina
Add a spacing below for tables	Writer	Add a spacing below for tables in Writer. In normal text flow the style text body is used, which gives good distance between two paragraphs. It has a spacing above of 0cm and a spacing below of 0.21cm. But after a table the text nearly touches the border of the table, because the table has spacing 0cm. And if you do not use borders the spacing is to small too, because the style Table contents has below spacing 0cm too.	Regina
Uncheck transparency warning	All	Uncheck transparency warning in Tools > Options. Modern PCs are fast enough to calculate transparency. So most oft the users no longer need this warning.	Regina
change default color in form wizard	Database	the default background color of an default form document, created by the form wizard, is anything like orang -> this is a bad default and looks unprofessional => change it in anything common like 'light gray'	MSC
switch off impress wizard	Impress	looks old fashioned, is redundant and annoying	WG
Default Clipboard Format for vector graphics	All except Draw	If someone paste a vector graphic into a document, he normally doesn't intend to edit it there, but most probably he needs to resize it. Unfortunately scaling of embedded Draw graphics doesn't work, because text will not scaled proper. Until this work, the user must use Paste Special->As GDI-Metafile. I think GDI-Metafile should be the default here.	Jörg
Changing default font	Impress & Draw	Issue 70585 It should be possible to change the overall default font for text (not the GUI) in Impress permanently, using one centralized setting, for example Options -> Openoffice.org -> fonts -> Change default font or somewhere similar. This is especially a problem when working with asian languages. I know you can work around the problem using templates, but it is neither quick, nor is it likely to appear obvious to the average user.	Clu
Change default pen color from neon green	Impress	Issue 47990 As described in BUG 10922 the neon green color of the pen used to draw on a presentation is very difficult to see for students in a classroom, and the color is hard coded into OOo. I would like to see the default changed to perhaps black or red, as they are much easier colors to see. BUG 10922 is still a very good idea, but I filed this report to request a simple change of the default color, which should be much easier than what BUG 10922 is requesting. A slightly more ambitious, but still not difficult, would be to read the color value from a file or some such, instead of hard coding it in the OOo source. p.s. available after .. menue: slide show / slide show settings & check 'mouse pointer as pen' & starting a presentation	Clu
Don't emulate MS Office's annoying "clippy"	All	Options | OpenOffice | General and then Turn off Help Agent and Turn on Extended Tips	Safway
Please set all checkboxes in Change Tools --> Options --> Load/Save --> Microsoft Office by default	All	It is very annoying that these checkboxes are not checked by default because users which own Microsoft Office and open a document with an Excel OLE-object see a document in a different way than a user who does not have Microsoft Office installed. This is because (by default) an installed Excel is used to render the xls-diagrams while (when Excel is not installed) OpenOffice.org is used to render it. When a user sends such a document to a different user it seems as if OpenOffice.org does not display the document in the same way as on the other computer. But the problem is in the OLE-object. When the boxes are checked it would be a better default.	parity
Tab Stops with reasonable settings	All	Tools > Options > Writer or Writer/Web or Calc or Impress or Draw > General > Settings > Tab stops = 0.50 instead of 0.49	Safway
Grid Settings much more manageable and understandable	All	Tools > Options > Writer or Writer/Web or Calc or Impress or Draw > Grid Snap to Grid should be off. Visible Grid should be off. Resolution > Horizontal = 0.10 instead of 0.39. Resolution > Vertical = 0.10 instead of 0.39. Synchronize axes should be on.	Safway
Table keyboard handling consistent	Calc	Tools > Options > Calc > Table > Keyboard handling > Insert cell > Column = 0.20 like the others instead of 0.98.	Safway
Anchor context sensitive toolbars by default	All	Context sensitive toolbars (like table, image toolbars) is a great feature when you get used to it, but new users just see a toolbar popping in front of their work. I always dock those toolbars to the bottom edge of the window. I think this could be a good default for new (and old) users.	RGB
Change "Show as tip" for word completion	Writer	The word completion is a useful feature, but the way it is shown by default is quite "disturbing": if a long suggestion pops when you are near the page edge the word you are writing will jump to next line. "Show as tooltip is a better alternative, IMO. The option is on Tools -> AutoCorrect Options -> Word Completion tab	RGB
<Idea>	<Application>	<Description>	<Name>