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Could anybody familiar with the Windows' screen terminology help
me, please? In our users manual for our Windows application, I denote
miscellaneous Windows elements according to the MS Manual of
Style. In most cases, this works satisfactorily. But I wonder one thing. In
our
application, we have several types of windows. In many cases, I call
them xxx dialog box, since they actually serve to convey the user's
input to the system. But there are different types of windows like
these:
1. Displays the system's status for the user to view but does not have
setting
fields to convey user's input.
2. It may be a dialog box but may rather be called "editor" or "window"
since it is where the user edit a program to run the system.
Do you think it is ok to call them xxx dialog box? In the MS manual, where
a very specific element name is defined, they often note, "In general, do
not
use the terms xxx in end-user material; use xxx instead." This confuses me
even worse! In our application, differenciating such terms does not seem
so important to the user. In this sense, I can work around using the most
neutral word "window" to refer to all the windows. But if there are
appropriate
terminologies, I prefer that.
I appreciate any comment or enlightenment.
Thank you very much in advance!
----------------------
Nana Kato
nana -at- tenryutechnics -dot- co -dot- jp
