I am working on a GUI (OpenG Builder). How can I merge the Save and Save As button into one button?
My thoughts go to a 'hot spot' for 'save as' on the right side of the button, indicated by a glyph.
How can I implement this feature in an intuitive way (GUI Screenshots, hints)?
I am not looking for an ActiveX/.Net implementation. A description or screen shot will suffice.
What about a Save button with a dropdown menu attached to it, similar to the way that the old Back button used to work in web browsers, where you could either click Back to go back one page, or click the arrow to go back multiple pages. Clicking the "Save" button would just save, while clicking the arrow would bring up choices (Save, Save As, etc...).
My concern with merging these features would be that Save is a (potentially) destructive operation, while save as is a (potentially) non-destructive operation. It would be a Bad Thing to have a user accidentally click the wrong place and perform a destructive operation when they were trying to perform a non-destructive one.
I think this is backwards. "Save" is a frequent operation, absolutely necessary for normal workflow. Access to "Save" should be as easy as possible. Save As, on the other hand, is rarely used, and requires extra user interaction.
Combining Save and Save As is a kind of solution that appeals to us programmers - logical, clean, and not user friendly at all.
If you are in control of your own file format then just store revisions within the file, thus there is no need for Save As. Save never destroys any of your work if you keep revisions.
Once you have that going you can remove the "Save" button all together and do it periodically for the user.
I agree with the other posters that this just isn't a good idea overall. However, if you must do it, I think the simplest way is just to have the "Save" button always act as a "Save As..." button (i.e. always open the File dialog). The dialog should default to the file and location last saved, so to do an ordinary save you just click the Save button, then OK and then Yes to the "do you want to overwrite ... " question.
Scott posted essentially what I was going to say, so I'll just add a related observation. IrfanView, the popular image viewer for Windows, goes to some effort to make Save harder than Save As. The toolbar button with the common Save icon actually performs Save As. The toolbar does not even have a button that does the standard Save.
I presume the author designed it like this because doing Save on an image in potentially lossy format may be destructive. As is, the program makes it more likely for users to invoke Save As instead. Sometimes it is annoying, when you do want Save, but the safety-first approach has helped me on a few occasions.
Which is to say, please do not merge Save and Save As. If anything, they need to be as clearly distinct as possible to prevent costly mis-clicks.
