Death to dialog!
Open/Save Dialog Boxes to be more exact.
I am talking about those annoying pop-up windows that applications expel when interacting with document files (opening or saving them). They are way past their useful life and now days are just a hindrance to a consistent mental model in the user experience of modern operating systems.
Why the hindrance? They are simply redundant devices to a much more comprehensive one: The Finder (Desktop, or Windows Explorer, or whatever you want to name it). Visually parsing file compilations on any modern operating system is already achieved through the metaphor of windows displaying groupings of files or folders. You dive through different levels by the opening of folders into additional windows (and increasingly, through searches and tagging filters)… Why then, the need of activating a second apparatus when interacting with the very same files through an application? Inertia. Inertia from obsolete reasons that could only validate by going back to the days of the birth of the Dialog Box, when it appeared (to the public at large at least) on the Lisa operating system, later on the Mac and soon after in Windows.
1st. Obsolete justification.
Dialog Boxes were literal visual translation of the preceding command-line interaction mental model: Open > This File This meant: Initiate application, then define an action first, and finally specify the affected file. In a way, interaction was application-centric. On any modern GUI though, interactions should be document-centric (As the finder affords): This File > Open The system figures out what is your default application and activates necessary assets.
2nd. Obsolete justification.
Dialog Boxes were needed for a strong reason: Operating systems were not yet multi-tasking… You were either working on a word processor, or navigating the finder, or interacting with a spreadsheet. The idea of protected memory was yet not finessed and you had to quit a previous task to initiate a new one. Therefore, when inside of an application (Paint program for example), you were forced to “open a porthole” into the file system. Now days, with the ability to switch not only windows but applications with ease… We do not need to open a gap from one modal environment to another… We reach the Finder and all our files are there contained within a richer experience than the narrow view of a small window. There are also available strategies like the “Open recent” menu or the “Welcome Dashboard” (aka Project Gallery) that make Open/Save Dialog boxes less and less necessary. So why not simply get rid of Dialog Boxes and use the Finder instead? Beyond the previous inertia, there are two big reasons remaining:
- When opening files within an application, it is many times desirable to filter the type of files (to look at only text files, or only images, etc).
- When saving a file (perhaps a more complex task), you first have to specify its attributes (such as name, format, compression, etc.)
The first challenge is being resolved by the increasing sophistication of the finder windows themselves. In both Mac OS 1.4 and the upcoming Windows Vista, any content of a window in the finder can be easily filtered with pre-assigned filters (i.e. Smart folders in the Mac). So jumping from an application to a finder showing relevant documents could easily be achieved. The second one is more difficult to resolve… But not by any model less convoluted that the Dialog Box!… So here goes my proposal:
“Open” dialog box: The button, menu or command of “Open…” simply switches to finder with the default location for the application (last cluster accessed) showing filters activated (i.e. images in .jpg format) and other relevant and available filters (i.e. images in .gif, .bmp, etc). The user, already comfortable with finder navigation, has the freedom to explore, temporarily suspend (Something which the restrictive and modal Dialog Box does not allow) or simply cancel the operation by switching back to the application.
“Save” dialog box: The button, menu or command of “Save as…” simply switches to finder with the default location for the application (last cluster accessed) with file placed, name selected (ready to take user input) and available to be moved by drag-and-drop if so desired. A technique just as expedient as it would be to navigate with the controls of a Dialog Boxes… but simpler as it recycles existing skills on operating the Finder. And for saving formats other than default? Well, that warrants another essay called Death to formats! As current trends in storage capacity and transmission already allow for the luxury of format-agnostic files, where the additional resources or necessary for opening on different applications could already embedded in the file (In the metadata or resource fork), and a computational disambiguation algorithm to convert among them could be part of the applications or operating system themselves (this last one specially when dealing with legacy programs unaware of future “formats”by offering them only what they understand). The additional burden of saving all available formats in one file (in size weight or computational time) that this strategy might incur is a minimal and transparent annoyance compared to the long-standing barrier of understanding formats. Most users still do not get the difference on WHY using a .jpg versus a .gif! In fact, it is all useless detritus in their day-to-day cognition process.This proposal is not utopian. In the past, Apple used to adopt a similar approach (the format suffix was hidden by default and not needed as the system looked for its definition on the resource fork). My pitch goes further in actually integrating the different formats into a single raw file, pretty much as Adobe Illustrator files already imbed (optionally) enough information to be opened by either PDF readers or its own editing software, even including external resources as fonts and images. Apple in any case, seems to be moving on a similar direction with the adoption of XML for tying together all the resources that go into their files (which behave more and more like packages) for their software Pages or Keynote. ICO is also a good example of a file that provides different information depending on the needs of the application (16×16 graphic to a browser, 32×32 to the XP desktop). The recent DNG approach to photographs in raw format is also the right step towards neutral files.Any of the previous proposals support a document-centric approach in the design of operating systems, a closer experience to real-life manipulations where you employ a polyvalent or “multipurpose format” document (i.e. “piece of paper” and act upon it with different applications (i.e. “markers, pencils, scissors, glue”).Yes, it is that simple really. Lets kill unnecessary dialog… with the machine.
