IM Chooser Design Re: Fedora 7: SCIM Launch Problem

[Warren Togami]

http://togami.com/~warren/archive/2007/im-chooser.png
Existing im-chooser interface.

Maureen Duffy (our expert UI engineer) and I spent some time in front of 
a whiteboard.  We came up with this design to improve im-chooser to 
support the desired IM behavior.  More work on the backend X init 
scripts need to be done.  I am further examining those next.

http://togami.com/~warren/archive/2007/im-chooser-design.jpg
The labels could change, but here are some design consideration notes.

Radial Buttons:
Option 1) Automatic and tells you which it is for your language
Option 2) Enable and choose a specific IM
Option 3) Disable IM

- There is an explicit option for enabling and disabling, separate from 
the automatic option.  This makes it very clear that choosing and 
disabling is different from the automatic behavior.
- The automatic option plainly tells the user what the automatic IM for 
their session locale is.  "None" would be displayed for English for example.
- "Locale" is not used in the label because it is too technical. 
"Language" is close enough in meaning and easier to understand.
- "Do not use" instead of "Disable", because the latter could be scary 
to users who don't know what Input Methods are.  "Do not use" doesn't 
sound like you will break your keyboard.
- The legacy radial button was confusing, so it is eliminated.  If 
legacy software like kinput2 is installed, "Legacy XIM" could appear in 
the drop-down combo box instead.

Warren Togami
wtogami at redhat.com