Re: [Rhythmbox-devel] Notification area and HIG

[Seth Nickell <seth gnome org>]

Section not to be followed... As noted, it is a placeholder.

On Tue, 25 Nov 2003 4:19am, Luca Ferretti wrote:
> The HIG draft has a section about notification area behavior and usage.
> Take a look to Usability page on developer.gnome.org for more info.
>
> Here a small summarize and some personal notes.
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
>
> <quote id="1">
> This area is reserved for notifying the user of non-critical,
> application-related events (for example, arrival of new email, or a 
> chat
> 'buddy' having logged on), and for monitoring the status of system 
> tasks
> (for example, network or printer activity, or laptop battery charging).
> </quote>
>
> So the current rb usage of not.area is wrong. But what about put an 
> icon
> when the playing track change? This is of course a non-critical and
> application-related event. Let's go reading
>
> <quote id="2">
> write an applet instead of using the notification area if:
>       * clicking your notification area icon does anything other than
>         opening a window directly associated with the icon (e.g. a mail
>         folder window for a new mail icon, or a print queue window for
>         printer notification icon), or
>       * there are icon-specific options on its context menu for doing
>         anything other than that
> </quote>
>
> Could someone explain it to me? Or better could you please go on and
> read the last quote (id=7) and explain me how can they match?
>
> BTW there are no rules about "use not.area instead of applet if..." :-(
>
> <quote id="3">Only core GNOME programs may perpetually display an icon
> or use flat images.</quote>
>
> A core program is an application included in GNOME Desktop release,
> isn't it?
>
> <quote id="4">Icons should not usually appear animated. The may change
> to indicate a change of state, but should not do so when that change is
> occurs regularly rapidly.</quote>
>
> <quote id="5">An icon may blink for n (=5?) seconds when first 
> displayed
> if showing the icon is not caused by user action.</quote>
>
> (print is user driven, so no blink; new email can blink)
>
> <quote id="6">Do not rely on blinking or animation as a means of
> alerting the user to any particular event</quote>
>
> </quote id="7">
>       * Double-click or Space key should perform the icon's default
>         action. Normally this should open a window with relevant data,
>         for example:
>               * the printer queue for a printing-in-progress icon.
>               * the inbox for an incoming email icon
>               * the message for an incoming message
>       * Right-click or Shift-F10 should present a menu for the icon
>         containing at least the icon's default action."
> </quote>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------
>
> Now the question is: can Rhythmbox use the notification area?
>
> Of course the current behavior is wrong: we aren't notifying anything,
> but we are providing a "small-mode".
>
> The only event that Rhythmbox can notify to user is the track change.
> Moreover, if I'm right, we can't perpetually display an icon in
> not.area.
>
> So the only acceptable behavior in my mind is:
>      1. track change and a blinking icon appear in notification area
>      2. move mouse pointer over it and a tooltip with new song's title,
>         artist, duration and rating appear
>      3. double click the icon to open the rb window
>      4. right clic the icon to pop-up a menu
>      5. you move your mouse away and the icon in not.area disappear
>      6. if you don't move the mouse over the icon before 15~20 seconds
>         the icon disappear
>
> Note to point 4: menu should be at least
>  _____________
> | Open Window |
> |-------------|
> | Next Song   |
> | Prev Song   |
> |_____________|
>
> This is should be an acceptable behavior. But note that it lives on the
> edge: new mail is an unplanned event, while a song change is not. You
> don't need to be alerted: "Hey, wake up, song is change!!!". The
> Rhythmbox not.icon is more a facilities to 1) hide the window 2) go to
> next or prev song.
>
> IMHO we should forget the not.area and move to a good mini window.
>
> _______________________________________________
> rhythmbox-devel mailing list
> rhythmbox-devel@gnome.org
> http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/rhythmbox-devel
-Seth