Bug 38509 - Meaningless text and missing Help for Options Dialog checkbox "Experimantal (unstable) features
Summary: Meaningless text and missing Help for Options Dialog checkbox "Experimantal (...
Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 54699
Alias: None
Product: LibreOffice
Classification: Unclassified
Component: UI (show other bugs)
Version:
(earliest affected)
3.4.2 RC2
Hardware: All All
: medium normal
Assignee: David Nelson
URL:
Whiteboard:
Keywords:
: 49636 50444 52109 (view as bug list)
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2011-06-20 16:08 UTC by Planas
Modified: 2012-12-16 17:17 UTC (History)
6 users (show)

See Also:
Crash report or crash signature:


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Description Planas 2011-06-20 16:08:24 UTC
In the TOOLS>>OPTIONS> LibreOffice > General enabling macro recording requires one to check a box labeled "Enable Experimental (Unstable) Features". Most users would not realize this is how you enable macro recording.

Recommended solutions is to relabel as "Enable Macro Recording" so it is more obvious to users.
Comment 1 Don't use this account, use tml@iki.fi 2011-06-21 01:57:25 UTC
That option presumably enables/disables many unrelated experimental and unstable features, not just macro recording.

And if we say ourselves that such a feature is unstable, why would we want to make it easy and tempting for users to turn it on (and then complain when it indeed crashes)?
Comment 2 Rainer Bielefeld Retired 2011-07-26 04:23:26 UTC
Due to "Getting Started Guide - Chapter 2 Setting up LibreOffice"
experimental features in LibreOffice currently are 
- in-line formula editing 
- macro recording

So much place is available in the dialog.
If more applications are affected, we need useful Help

We can not have a checkbox in GUI without telling user what it's for, and if we ourselves do not know, we should find out. 

@David:
Currently no useful help is available, Help for that dialog item ends for heading "Document status".

Can you please add useful Help and then reassign to someone who can complete dialog text for E.F (if necessary and feasible)?
Comment 3 Sigrid Carrera 2011-07-26 15:34:11 UTC
We had an "error report" for this on the German discuss list. 

Here's my suggestion for the help-text for the two missing entries: 



Allowing to save unchanged documents

This option allows to save a document that wasn't changed since you last saved/opened it. This setting is disabled by default. 





Activating experimental features
 
This setting activates experimental - and therefore probably buggy - features in the program. This includes features like the macro recorder or the in-line editing of Math formulae. If you find any bugs, please check the support page in the online help. 

(A. Schnabel: The last sentence is a note for the developer to link to this page.) 


Corrections to the wording is welcome.
Comment 4 Rainer Bielefeld Retired 2011-07-26 22:44:17 UTC
@Sigrid:
Looks good, should be integrated. 

Now the question remains what to do with the UI text line. If the Help links in the Help buttons would be more context related we could leave it, but currently i takes a half dozen clicks until you reach Help for the dialog.
Comment 5 David Nelson 2011-07-27 00:03:15 UTC
I am forwarding this bug to the documentation ML so that we can figure out a text and add it to the help.
Comment 6 manj_k 2012-05-08 06:48:52 UTC
*** Bug 49636 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 7 manj_k 2012-06-16 14:28:52 UTC
*** Bug 50444 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 8 manj_k 2012-07-15 21:57:34 UTC
*** Bug 52109 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
Comment 9 manj_k 2012-07-15 22:11:41 UTC
See also: 
- 'Bug 41865 - Make Macro recording work without turning Experimental features on (in the Options)'
- Macro recording... https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/ReleaseNotes/3.6#Core
Comment 10 manj_k 2012-12-16 17:17:21 UTC

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 54699 ***