"Defaults" button in every settings screen

Michael Orlitzky michael at orlitzky.com
Fri Dec 9 16:17:21 CET 2011


On 12/08/2011 12:29 PM, Jannis Pohlmann wrote:
> On Fri, 09 Dec 2011 02:23:10 +0900
> Andrzej<ndrwrdck at googlemail.com>  wrote:
>
>> On 12/08/2011 07:48 AM, Robby Workman wrote:
>>>
>>>> I think one small but very useful feature that I would hope
>>>> XFCE would inherit from KDE is "Defaults" button in desktop
>>>> settings dialogs.
>>>
>>> I tend to agree that this would be useful.  Since nobody replied,
>>> and since this list is primarily for user issues (as opposed to
>>> development issues), please file a feature/enhancement request
>>> on the bugzilla.
>>
>> I agree, this has bit me several times already. It's way too easy,
>> for example, to wipe out the whole list of plugins in the panel.
>
> And it is also easy to add them again. Personally, I'd say reverting to
> default settings is almost useless because as a user you just don't
> know what will happen if you press such a button. The current settings
> may be much closer to what you really want than the default settings.

It's not useful to you, because you know what the settings do.

One of the first things people do with their DE is play around with the 
theme settings. If a new user somehow screws up his fonts or WM 
behaviour, it's nice for him to have a "fix it" button that puts them 
back the way they should be -- he probably doesn't even know what he 
"really wants."

True story: let's say someone gives you a laptop with a BIOS you've 
never seen before. He says he's been playing around in the BIOS, but he 
doesn't remember what he changed, and now his computer is "acting 
funny." How long does it take you to fix it?

Assuming the options really are foreign to you (let's say they're in 
Klingon), it will take hours. With a "revert to defaults" button 
(conveniently, this button is in English) it will take seconds.


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