Cancelling a post
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I understand why the wording is as it is but it doesn't change the fact that it feels so wrong to me.
Consider:
Are you sure you want to abandon your post?- Yes, abandon
- No, keep
I'd argue that abandon has negative connotations, just as keep has positive ones. But here you're asking me if I want to positively assert a negative action. It's like saying "Yes, I don't want that", it may be correct but it seems illogical.
Alternative 1: just yes/no
Are you sure you want to abandon your post?- Yes
- No
Hmm. I don't like that so much because it's still tying a positive assertion to a negative action.
Alternative 2: just the actions
Are you sure you want to abandon your post?- Abandon
- Keep
Better, IMO. Not ideal, but better. The problem is we're still asking a question where a positive answer means a negative outcome.
Consider alternative 3:
Don't you want to keep your post?- Yes, keep it
- No, I don't want it
Yes on the left, no on the right, even make No more visibly prominent if you must but that way we're following a positive action with a positive assertion. Just feels more civilised to me to do that even though it's really the same thing presented differently.
Or you could ignore me.
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Alternative 3 asks a question where the answer is the opposite of "do you want to do what you just told me you want to do?"
That's confusing as well.
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Are you sure you want to delete funny_cat_picture.jpg.exe?
- Yes, delete
- No, keep
Are you sure you want to delete funny_cat_picture.jpg.exe?
- Yes
- No
Are you sure you want to delete funny_cat_picture.jpg.exe?
- Delete
- Keep
Don't you not want to not delete funny_cat_picture.jpg.exe?
- Ok
- Cancel
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FILE_NOT_FOUND to you too.
'delete' is better than 'abandon'.
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But there's nothing to delete. You haven't made a post yet. It's like closing Microsoft Word and choosing "don't save".
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Sure there is. If you cancel with no content, nothing is asked of you. If you cancel with content, it's almost certainly going to have saved a draft for you, so that's what you're deleting - that draft.
The UI even tells you that it's saved it with the little 'saved' in the middle of the bar at the bottom.
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#Cancel?
- Cancel
- Cancel
- Cancel
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Delete refers to the Draft it auto saves, so yes, there's content to delete, the saved temporary data.
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In all, I think alternative 2 is best.
I can understand how tying a positive response to a negative consequence can feel awkward - and I believe that the wording in alt. 2 mitigates it somewhat by specifying the actual actions - but the... ahem... alternative (3, to be exact) means a clumsilily worded question. At first reading, I wasn't sure what was being asked.
In the end, the user initiated an action and is now being asked to confirm that action, because it may have negative consequences (otherwise - what's the point?) In a "Are you sure you want to do that?" situation, I expect the confirmation to be in place of the "OK" button. Alternative 3 would actually work against muscle memory, break the Principle of Least Surprise, be a barrier to reading etc.
My 2c.
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I think the ideal TDWTF dialog should look like this:
You can choose to either keep this post or abandon it, what would you like to do?
Yes No FILE_NOT_FOUND [Let @mikeTheLiar decide for me]
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You can choose to either keep this post or abandon it, what would you like to do?
Yes No FILE_NOT_FOUND [Let @mikeTheLiar decide for me]In addition, I propose "nostalgia", or "classic" mode, where choices become:
Yes No FILE_NOT_FOUND [Fucking hell why does it delete two posts when I click cancel once]
Keeping the classic conventions, the last options should use
and properly not fit on a small screen.
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Keeping the classic conventions, the last options should use  and properly not fit on a small screen.
Also, the options should be centre aligned, pushing Yes and No off the left side of the screen, leaving the only available options:
LE_NOT_FOUND [Fucking hell why does it delete tw
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In all, I think alternative 2 is best.
I can understand how tying a positive response to a negative consequence can feel awkward - and I believe that the wording in alt. 2 mitigates it somewhat by specifying the actual actions - but the... ahem... alternative (3, to be exact) means a clumsilily worded question. At first reading, I wasn't sure what was being asked.
In the end, the user initiated an action and is now being asked to confirm that action, because it may have negative consequences (otherwise - what's the point?) In a "Are you sure you want to do that?" situation, I expect the confirmation to be in place of the "OK" button. Alternative 3 would actually work against muscle memory, break the Principle of Least Surprise, be a barrier to reading etc.
My 2c.
Agreed.