UserInterfaceWording

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Revision 1 as of 2009-01-12 13:52:59

Clear message

As Launchpad is becoming both bigger and more sophisticated, it is increasingly important for developers to be able to get small UI-related things right themselves, and for reviewers to be able to check these things. So here are some low-level guidelines.

Web pages

Text

These guidelines apply to Web pages, e-mail messages, and any other media used in the future.

Don’t use this

Use this instead

abort

stop

above

this, these

click

nothing

below

this, these

DOAP

nothing

FOAF

nothing

illegal

not allowed

invalid

incorrect (or more specific error)

just

nothing

Malone

Launchpad or Launchpad’s bug tracker

Note:

nothing

Note that

nothing

please (unless announcing serious inconvenience)

nothing

Rosetta

Launchpad or Launchpad Translations

simply

nothing

Soyuz

nothing

the following

this, these

the form

nothing

this form

nothing

this page

nothing

to the left

better page layout

to the right

better page layout

*

better text ordering

!

nothing (or, if in real danger, <strong>)

Template code

Don’t use this

Use this instead

<b>

<th>, <dt><dfn>, <strong>

<br>

<li>, <div>...</div>

metal:fill-slot="pageheading"

metal:fill-slot="main"

<h3> (unless <h2> is used earlier in the page)

<h2>, <div>

<hr>

nothing, <table class="listing">

<i>

nothing, <em>, <var>

onclick=

MochiKit to attach event handlers to elements (and to create the elements too, if they do nothing without JavaScript).
See the JavaScriptStyleGuide for more information.

style= (unless this style is used nowhere else)

HTML elements, classes

<ul><li tal:repeat="bar bars"...

<ul tal:condition="bars"><li tal:repeat="bar bars"...

<div tal:replace=...
<span tal:replace=...

<tal:one-word-summary replace=...
<tal:one-word-summary replace=...
(functionally identical, but more informative for those reading the code later)

' (ASCII single quote used for an apostrophe), '

&#8217; oror

"foo" (ASCII double quotes), "

andorand

'foo' (ASCII single quotes)

andorand

See also PageTemplateHacking, which may be mergable with this page.

Capitalization

Notifications, warnings, and errors

Follow the guidelines specified in AlertMessages.

Cancelling actions

The actions at the end of a form should consist of a button, followed by the word "or" and a Cancel link:

( Summary of Action ) or Cancel

The "Cancel" link should return you to the page you came from. (To get this link, define the cancel_url @property in the browser class.)

E-mail messages

These guidelines apply to all e-mail messages:

These guidelines apply to notifications not being sent on behalf of a Launchpad user:

Comments and suggestions

I've struggled with writing instructions that do not use 'click'. I often use phrasing like 'choose', 'activate' or 'follow'. None are satisfactory. I do not use 'click' nonetheless. -- CurtisHovey