Tangentially related, one brought up the other. I am just trying to improve things here.
It would be usefull to define what problem you see with aboutsystem that you want to solve
Historically, there were about boxes in many apps (usually a simple BAlert, before BAboutWindow was introduced). And we discussed this a few years ago, decided it was useless to have separate about windows that no one remembers to update, and removed most of them since AboutSystem already covered the credits for most things.
But there are edge cases, for example:
- Cortex and ProcessController, which were largely developped as 3rd party BeOS apps and only later included in Haiku.
- WebPositive, mainly because it is a âbigâ application that deserves its own about box, and we also use that to credit haikuwebkit contributors.
I donât think there needs to be a specific and explicit rule here. If you think an app youâre working on deserves an about box because you have something important to say in it, go for it. If you think itâs useless, remove it. Some of these apps have a specific history, or are complex enough to justify it. Some donât.
Yes, I agree with that. I donât really see a problem with the current design. I think it is not the first time you start making changes to Aboutsystem but I still donât see why you focus on this particular window, which I think works reasonably well as it is.
We dicussed this a bit privately and here is a summary of my thoughts:
The main use case for AboutSystem is reading the list in full, like a document. In that usage, scrolling through the text is the expected way. It works also a bit like a credits roll in a movie, something everyone is familiar with. It is also similar to the BAboutWindow used in other apps.
A secondary use case is âlook, my name is here!â which is useful only for the people who are listed in the list. And Iâd say they can easily remember where they are.
The use case you seem to be working on is âI want to access a specific section of the creditsâ, and I donât see a case where someone needs to do this.
So, I donât see it as âimprovingâ things, just change for the sake of change. It is attacking things from the wrong angle. If you want to imrove things, you first need to identify a problem to solve. Here I think you have a solution looking for a problem. And there are a few existing problems to solve if you really want to work on AboutSystem: Custom Query â Haiku
I think fixing #5974, #14468 and the already mentionned #16130 would be nice. Maybe also #7706?
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It still does not remember its last position on desktop.
And you cannot copy text (hrev) from it.
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Remember the 3dmix about box? That you could interact with by attracting the pixels with the mouse pointer which also created crazy sounds? Now that was an about box!
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