Re: empathy integration with the desktop

[John Stowers <john stowers lists gmail com>]

> 
> As a new user of gnome-shell when I installed the Fedora 15 Alpha, my
> first thought was that "Available" and "Busy" referred to my IM
> status, and there was nothing that indicated to me that they had
> anything to do with the notification system. I only made that
> connection from a stray reference on either this list or the
> gnome-shell mailing list. My guess is that a lot of users will make
> the same connection and be confused when those settings don't seem to
> do anything to their IM status (even assuming they knew that they had
> to start empathy to begin with).

Wow, totally agree. 

I have been testing the shell for months now and, embarrassingly, your
email is the first time I have heard that those items in the user menu
had any affect on notifications.

As an ex-ubuntu user I assumed they were similar to the me-menu and
adjusted IM presence only.

Without wishing to cast myself as representative, I think this needs to
be much clearer, not just for new users, but existing users who might be
used to Ubuntu / Unity.

> 
> >
> > Basically, mapping desktop status with IM status can be tricky. IIRC
> > Ubuntu used to automatically connect accounts when changing the presence
> > using their presence indicator and stopped doing so because loads of
> > users were wondering why their IM accounts were suddenly online.
> 
> I think a bigger issue with the ubuntu Me Menu is that in the initial
> state after login, the IM status menu items are desensitized, and
> empathy (just as unintuitively as in Alexander's use case) needs to be
> started from the messaging menu, which is two items away on the
> notification menu bar. In both cases, the proper behavior should not
> necessarily address the IM status at login, but actually making the
> menu items useful in adjusting that status. Even though I hardly ever
> use IM, I do try to remember to have it on when I am working from
> home, and I occasionally (maybe 3-4 times a month) chat with my wife
> when I am at the office and she's on the computer at home. That said,
> the task of muting and unmuting notifications seems to be a rather
> lower priority than setting online status, and I don't think that the
> current menu items communicate their purpose particularly well.

Agree. I too use IM infrequently and even in the Ubuntu case every time
I click on items in the me-menu I am unsure if it will sign me in, make
me online, take me out of invisible, or start empathy for me to do any
of those options.

The shell needs to communicate more clearly why clicking on these items
will do wrt. IM. Perhaps every click on these items could be via
starting/showing the empathy main window, if for no other reason to
introduce people to its existence.

John

> 
> Michael Knepher
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