Testing the Apply/Close/Save buttons in Manuscript Build Settings Dialog

[awqk]

Tried and determined what the buttons at the bottom do, because it's not immediately obvious:

• Apply
  --> saves changes
  --> the name in the builds list is updated, if the name has been changed
  --> a subsequent Preview or Build uses these changes (whereas a Print does not)
  --> the print only updates when preceded by a preview
• Close
  --> closes dialog (keeps the changes applied so far, discarding the rest)
• Save
  --> saves changes and closes dialog

Straightforward and simple from the programmer's view, because save and close are separate operations, and why not have a button for each one, and a button for both.

What users might think or expect looking at the dialog:

• Apply
  --> you see something change, for example the preview
  --> you don't know if the changes are saved, or if they can be cancelled
  ? there's no Cancel or Undo, so probably they can't be cancelled
• Close
  --> closes dialog
  ? this may save the changes or not
  ? although the x-Icon indicates this is more like a Cancel
• Save
  --> saves changes and keeps dialog open
  ! because the disk icon implies this is a save only
  ! because there is also a dedicated Close button
  ? although in all other novelwriter dialogs this button also closes

Suggestions:

1. make Apply update the preview automatically
   --> the Print button behaves consistently
   --> the user immediately sees what his changes are doing to their manuscript
   --> you no longer need to bring the Manuscript Build dialog to the front to click Preview
2. you're in a bind here, unless you implement some kind of rollback to the earlier settings, you can't rename Close to Cancel without having second thoughts. It would be more consistent to all the other dialogs with Cancel and Save buttons, though, and it would be clearer to see at a glance what these buttons are supposed to do.
3. consider renaming the Save button to OK with a checkmark icon. This should be applied to all dialogs, but my guess is you probably had your reasons why you've done them this way and why you want to keep them as they are.

[vkbo]

So, TL;DR: The Apply and Save buttons should update the Preview?

[vkbo]

And to clarify why it doesn't update: It's because you can edit any build setting, not just the one being previewed. So the preview is not necessarily linked to the one you're editing. I think automatically applying the settings you're editing would be confusing if it forced a switch of previewed build settings to that one, or alternatively only refreshed if the previewed was the same. Both cases would result in different behaviour under different conditions. Currently, they are separate actions, which may require an extra click but at least behaves consistently and doesn't try to guess what you want.

The purpose of the Apply button is described in the docs.

[awqk]

So, TL;DR: The Apply and Save buttons should update the Preview?

Didn't think about Save - yet. I would say Apply implies the user wants to see something change on screen, whereas Save doesn't.

And to clarify why it doesn't update: It's because you can edit any build setting, not just the one being previewed.

Didn't think about that, too, but using Apply without preview doesn't make sense. If you don't want to see what's going on, you can just do your changes and save them when you're finished with the dialog.

I think it's perfectly alright to switch the preview whenever the user clicks Apply.

The purpose of the Apply button is described in the docs.

It's a truth universally acknowledged that self-explanatory is the way to go when only 1 in 4 people read the manual 😜.

Disclosure: I did read the docs, probably not diligently enough, because I don't remember all the details.