Open vs Appear, Yet Again (was: "RE: WG: Newbie question - GUI terminology")

[Sam Beard]

All,

   I tend to use "... the Whatever dialog box is displayed."

Sam Beard
Technical Communications - Special Projects
CTES - LP
936 521-2241
 

-----Original Message-----
From: techwr-l-bounces+sam.beard=ctes.com at lists.techwr-l.com
[mailto:techwr-l-bounces+sam.beard=ctes.com at lists.techwr-l.com] On
Behalf Of Andrew Warren
Sent: Monday, October 09, 2006 3:03 PM
To: beth.agnew at senecac.on.ca; techwr-l at lists.techwr-l.com
Subject: Open vs Appear,Yet Again (was: "RE: WG: Newbie question - GUI
terminology")

Beth Agnew wrote:

> The dislike for "appear" is the same as for "invoke", or any other
term
> which implies some magical action on the part of the computer user or
> the computer. .... Using magical language subtly contributed to the
> impression that there was arcane knowledge about computers that one
> needed to obtain.

Beth:

I keep hearing this, but it never makes sense to me.

"Appear", as any dictionary will tell you, just means "become visible".
It's no more "magical" a word than "rabbit" or "hat".

-Andrew

=== Andrew Warren  - awarren at synaptics.com
=== Synaptics, Inc - Santa Clara, CA
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