Bug 153417 - no help page for Edit Modules in Options - Language Settings - Writing Aids
Summary: no help page for Edit Modules in Options - Language Settings - Writing Aids
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: Documentation (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
7.2.7.2 release
Hardware: All All
: medium normal
Assignee: Not Assigned
URL:
Whiteboard: target:7.6.0
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks: Help-Link
  Show dependency treegraph
 
Reported: 2023-02-06 17:24 UTC by sdc.blanco
Modified: 2024-08-08 19:30 UTC (History)
2 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


Attachments
Screenshot (653.78 KB, image/png)
2023-02-07 11:02 UTC, Heiko Tietze
Details

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Description sdc.blanco 2023-02-06 17:24:01 UTC
Tools > Options > Language Settings > Writing Aids > Available Language Modules > Edit > Help

Result:  page not found (Help ID: cui/ui/editmodulesdialog/dialog-action_area1)


Additional Information:

1.  Select any item (heading or checkbox) in lower part of Edit Module dialog and press F1.  

Result:  Goes to appropriate "Edit module" help page.

https://help.libreoffice.org/7.6/en-US/text/shared/optionen/01010401.html?System=WIN&DbPAR=WRITER&HID=cui/ui/editmodulesdialog/lingudicts


2.  Could not get figure out how to Activate "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons.  (unclear whether this is a documentation problem or a design change in functionality.  Will ask UXEval).
Comment 1 sdc.blanco 2023-02-06 17:34:49 UTC
Questions for UXEval:

Tools > Options > Language Settings > Writing Aids > Available Language Modules

Question 1: What is the relation between the checkboxes shown in "Available Language Modules" and the "Edit Modules" checkboxes?

Perhaps this is something that should be clarified in the documentation.

https://help.libreoffice.org/7.6/en-US/text/shared/optionen/01010400.html

Additional note:

I am able to use Edit Modules to change what is selected for different languages, but was not able to make any changes in Edit Modules that has any consequences for what appears in Available Language Modules.

Question 2. In the "help" page, it says:  "If you click in front of the name of the module, you activate all the available sub-modules simultaneously."

This sentence is ambiguous.  It would seem to suggest that this option would be turned on for all languages. But this seems to contradict the fact that some options can be turned off in the Edit dialog.  Unclear if this is a "design" problem or a "documentation" problem.
Comment 2 Heiko Tietze 2023-02-07 11:02:11 UTC
Created attachment 185169 [details]
Screenshot

Looking at the UI the checkbox disables a dictionary in both the options tab as well the edit dialog. Move up/down becomes enabled if more than one item is available; the catch is that Spelling/Grammar/Hyphenation... are headings (indicated by being just bold). I guess that moving up makes this dictionary the priority. Admittedly not ideal, and an alternative to the unclear headings it could be a tree.

Btw, the button "Back" looks to me as if it works as a reset function.
Comment 3 sdc.blanco 2023-02-07 13:20:12 UTC
The OP started innocently as a report of a missing Help-Link, but has now expanded into queries about the operation of the dialog boxes themselves. Will ask questions here for now, and can spin out additional tickets if it seems appropriate.

As background, Getting Started Guide 7.3 and Writer Guide 7.3 have only minimal (almost identical) information about the Writing Aids/Edit Module dialogue, and both of them refer to Help for "details on using the Available Language Module". iow -- seems worth reviewing if the online help is clear in relation to the expected behavior of the dialogue.

(In reply to Heiko Tietze from comment #2)
> Looking at the UI the checkbox disables a dictionary in both the options tab
> as well the edit dialog. 
Not able to repro in Windows.  Any changes for individual languages in Edit Modules are "remembered" for the selected language, but does not make any changes in the main window. OS-specific problem?

Version: 7.6.0.0.alpha0+ (X86_64) / LibreOffice Community
Build ID: d466df5bc220eb80b8a51ff64507de881b938ed3
CPU threads: 8; OS: Windows 10.0 Build 19044; UI render: Skia/Raster; VCL: win
Locale: da-DK (da_DK); UI: en-US
Calc: CL threaded

New (related UX) question:  

Toggling an entry in the toplevel Available Language Modules (e.g., Hunspell) will (silently) "reset" any changes to individual languages that were made with Edit Modules.  That seems "bad" (even though it sort of documented, see Question 2 in comment 1).

Seems better to:
1. Drop Edit Module dialog.
2. Replace "Available Language Modules" title with "Language" selection dropdown box, plus have an "All Languages" option, which would change the setting for all languages (as currently happens silently at top level).
3. Drop "Edit" button and replace with "Move Up", "Move Down", "Back" from Edit module.

This would:
   - show more immediately and clearly what settings are made for a particular language. 
   - remove ambiguity about relation of top-level window to the entries in the Edit Modules dialog.
   - remove "silent" reset of individual language settings
   - eliminate an additional step for editing or checking individual languages 

With such a change, then it would also make sense to move the link for "adding dictionaries" to be under this window.  By showing the language at the top, can more quickly evaluate whether a relevant dictionary is installed.

> Move up/down becomes enabled if more than one item
Thanks for clarification.  (have not been able to figure out how to get more than one option to appear -- and could not find documentation).

> Btw, the button "Back" looks to me as if it works as a reset function.
Noticed also.  Perhaps:  https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/146532
Comment 4 Olivier Hallot 2023-02-11 17:47:31 UTC
Note:Latest 7.5 release, under experimental mode, the grammar checker can be Lightproof or Language Tool Remote Grammar Checker. Then the Move Up and Move Down buttons are enabled. 

patch submitted
https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/help/+/146823
Comment 5 Commit Notification 2023-02-13 09:59:05 UTC
Olivier Hallot committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "master":

https://git.libreoffice.org/help/commit/a295ef1fa2462d9a828341e7b947eae05ba14154

tdf#153417 Edit module options  Help page
Comment 6 Heiko Tietze 2023-02-15 08:43:13 UTC
(In reply to sdc.blanco from comment #3)
> Seems better to:
> 1. Drop Edit Module dialog.

Yes, seems so. You loose the ability to assign a certain dictionary to a specific language though. What bothers me is the fact that "Edit" below behaves completely different. 
Since adding dictionaries per extension has no apparent effect on these options it's hard to understand what all these options are good for.
Comment 7 sdc.blanco 2023-02-15 09:31:11 UTC
(In reply to Heiko Tietze from comment #6)
> (In reply to sdc.blanco from comment #3)
> > 1. Drop Edit Module dialog. 
> Yes, seems so. You loose the ability to assign a certain dictionary to a
> specific language though. 
Not if you follow suggestion nr. 2 in comment 3 and move the "language selection" dropdown box from the Edit Module up to the main window  (and possibly drop the "Available Language Modules" label to make room for the dropdown box).

(and then also follow suggestion nr. 3 and "replace" the "Edit" button with the "Move Up", "Move Down" and "Back" buttons from the "Edit Module" dialog.  iow -- all the functionality in the Edit Module dialog can/should be reproduced in the parent window.)

> What bothers me is the fact that "Edit" below behaves completely different. 
Below?  As in "User-defined dictionaries"? 

> Since adding dictionaries per extension has no apparent effect on these
> options it's hard to understand what all these options are good for.
Is there someone else who might be able to illuminate the situation?

Meanwhile, as noted in the help page:  "Mark all modules that are to be activated for this language under the headings Spelling, Hyphenation and Thesaurus."

But I have not been able to make a STR to demonstrate its practical consequences.

At a minimum, as noted in comment 3, it would be good to be able to explain/document the "expected" behavior (possibly with a "note" that extension dictionaries do not appear).

Maybe by solving the documentation problem, it will become apparent if a new ticket is needed for improving the dialog.
Comment 8 Commit Notification 2023-02-22 22:20:53 UTC
Seth Chaiklin committed a patch related to this issue.
It has been pushed to "master":

https://git.libreoffice.org/core/commit/7df725eda3330d62da204a95a177df1ae5b11f73

(related tdf#153417) rename "Back" to "Reset"

It will be available in 7.6.0.

The patch should be included in the daily builds available at
https://dev-builds.libreoffice.org/daily/ in the next 24-48 hours. More
information about daily builds can be found at:
https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Testing_Daily_Builds

Affected users are encouraged to test the fix and report feedback.
Comment 9 Dione Maddern 2024-08-08 19:30:22 UTC
It looks like the Help page now opens the correct help page and the issue with the "back" button has been fixed.

The page content could do with some updating, but I'm going to create a separate Bug for that, if one doesn't already exist.

I'm going to mark this as "resolved" since the original issue has been fixed.