I'm working on an application (Mac OS X, if it matters) that opens a user defined file or folder, does a bunch of operations on it (as set up on the main window and tracked on a progress bar), then saves the edited files at a different user-defined location, or over-writes the original file if the user so chooses. Right now, the workflow to select the file or folder is this:
1) The user clicks 'Start'
2) The Open dialog is presented
3) The Open dialog is closed, and the Save dialog is presented
4) The Save dialog is closed, and the app does its thing
To me at least, the two dialogs coming up one after another, while the quickest way to get the users settings, seems.... glitchy. Is there a better way to set this up? Would having two buttons on the main window, 'open...' and 'save as...', with labels next to each displaying the selected path, be better, even though it means several more objects cluttering the main window and a few more mouse clicks for the user to make?
Note: Due to the nature of the operations I'm doing, there's no reason for the user to ever view the file(s) in my app, so a traditional word-processor-looking paradigm isn't really in the cards.