Semantic: Options vs Settings vs Preferences (2024)

Configuration
Settings
Preferences
Options

All four are often used as interchangeable terms in English - however, they do have slightly different 'official' meanings...

Configuration- how you set up what an application does 'initially' - typically when you install it...
Settings- how you change what an application does after it's been installed...
Preferences- how you prefer an application to do things - after it's been installed [==settings]...
Options- how you change what an application does [after it's been installed] - including some things that it might not have done in the initial 'default configuration / settings': i.e. there might can be additional 'optional' settings that you can 'turn on or off'...

If there's no option to change a setting, you have no way to express your preference.

To be very technical, a "setting" is something that is "set." Your Ruby interpreter expects a ".rb" file extension. (One example of a setting that is not optional.)

If you can choose, for example, a level of indentation in your source code editor (please don't choose two!) you have an option. If you are writing Python, four spaces is mandatory so you don't have an option.

Preferences are probably best left to purely personal choices. I've set my browser's default background to an off-white color that I prefer; it's default font size to a my compromise between viewing more and reading easily. (And I dislike web pages, such as this forum, where the webmaster overrides my preference by specifying a pure white background. We should all respect our viewers preferences.)

@martinrinehart said:

If there's no option to change a setting, you have no way to express your preference. ...

Thank you, Martin. Eloquently put.

Another level of distinction is the choices that are program-wide and thus are saved by updating a configuration file or the Windows Registry, versus those that are model/file-specific and thus are saved with the document.

I used a program that had lots of this kind of customization and it called the system wide parameters "Preferences" and the file-specific ones "Settings". This resulted in lots of confusion on the part of users until they got the global vs. file distinction and then it was pretty easy to decide which category to look in.

Myself, I tend to think of "Settings" as things that have parameters and "Options" as things with toggles or a limited list of choices. I think of "Settings" as required to be set, to have a true default value, rather than a default state.

I think of "Preferences" as ideosyncratic, I cannot count on my preferences as being the same as someone else's. Default Save Directory would thus be a Setting while Click/Drag Drawing Method is a Preference. But Default Save Directory should certainly not be saved with the document and I cannot count on it being the same for another user. So the various aspects of distinction can conflict.

I hope this adds something,
August

@chris fullmer said:

I don't care what its called as long as its only called one thing. If you break it up and have a "preferences", "options", and "settings", then would ultimately just leda to confusion about what is where.

i agree if you're going to have options and preferences, at very least they should all be contained within a settings dialog. tabs would be nice.

Seems that Preferences is the clearest of the terms here. While the distinction of Option and Setting is a bit fuzzy.

@chris fullmer said:

I don't care what its called as long as its only called one thing. If you break it up and have a "preferences", "options", and "settings", then would ultimately just leda to confusion about what is where.

I agree with this.

I find semantics interesting - and I've wondered about this before when I've been writing application. But ever felt I got a proper grasp of the distinctions.

Looking up the dictionary:

Preference

@unknownuser said:

that which is preferred; choice: His preference is vanilla, not chocolate.

Option

@unknownuser said:

an item of equipment or a feature that may be chosen as an addition to or replacement for standard equipment and features: a car with a long list of extra-cost options; a telephoto lens option for a camera.

So Option indicate additional feature.

Setting
For the definition of this word I could not find anything that fit the topic.

Configuration

@unknownuser said:

the relative disposition or arrangement of the parts or elements of a thing.

@unknownuser said:

Computers. the totality of a computer and the devices connected to it: A common microcomputer configuration consists of a computer, two disk drives, a monitor, and a printer.

This would be more of a fixed composition of a system. ?

I think there is a need for different levels of terms.

"My SketchUp configuration is that I have it installed on my drive."

Out of "setting", "preference", and "option" I find none that replace "configuration" in that sentence.

The Ctrl, Shift, and Alt keys offer options in a tool's immediate behavior. Those options are not settings, preferences, or configuration.

The levels seem to be:

Installation
Application environment within the application (save directory, image editor, etc.)
Application startup (Template, active tool, etc.)
Tool default operations (Press-Move-Release, Click-Drag-Click)
In-Workflow changes (Wireframe Mode, Perspective On/Off, etc.)
In-Action changes (Ctrl, Alt, Shift options to a Tool's behavior, etc.)
While there seems to be a lot of overlap and interchangability in terms for the middle two, terms that apply to the top level make no sense when applied to the bottom level, and vice versa.

There is also a hierarch of where things are saved, but it does not exactly match the above list. None of the bottom-level options are saved anywhere. The top level can only be changed by re-installing. Some of the next level require restarting SketchUp. Some of the In-Workflow changes seem to be saved with the model, such as perspective and hidden-line mode.

I hope this helps,
August

"Setting" =
[noun] a assembly or collection of articles designed for use together in a particular operation...

we also forgot [ ] the similar
"Set up" =
[noun] an assembly or establishment of articles made ready for use...

Just the other day I read a Microsoft guideline stating which one was preferred in Windows, but I just can't find it anymore, and instead found my way back here (Hello everyone!). "Preferences" seem to be preferred on Mac. Config or configurations seem to be exclusively used in very technical contexts, not to what a user could change from a graphical UI.

Is any of the terms more used than others for SU extensions? I'm thinking about using Preferences as it matches SU's own phrasing, even though it might contradict MS guidelines.