Re: [Usability]Applets category for hardware stuff?

[Gregory Merchan <merchan phys lsu edu>]

On Sat, Oct 26, 2002 at 11:38:04PM +1000, Jeff Waugh wrote:
> Hey gang, Kevin,
> 
> Just looking at the Utilities category for applets, and realising that we
> probably have enough hardware-ish stuff to form another category.
> 
> Battery Charge Monitor, Disk Mounter, Keyboard Layout Switcher (maybe) and
> System Monitor could all shift to a 'System' or 'Hardware' category. I've
> also been looking at a few third party applets that would fit in here too.
> 
> Thoughts?

Battery Charge Monitor should be in the system tray. Unless the user has
deactived it, it should be there if a battery is detected on the machine.

Disk Mounter? I worry about why this might be needed. Is auto-mounting not
working? If there's some reason not to auto-mount something, nevermind this.

Keyboard Layout Switcher could also be in the tray since it usually shows
the state of the keyboard layout.

System Monitor is also a status indicator.

There are some other applets which should also be trayed:

  Clock
  Weather Report
  Inbox Monitor
  Volume Control

The CD Player might also be trayed after a redesign. What are not buttons
could become menu items. The tray icon (perhaps a CD) could appear in
response to inserting a CD. The menu items might change according to the
type of CD. Nautilus presumably would take responsibility for this and
show the tray icon instead of a desktop icon. If the tray is not present,
Nautilus can show the desktop icon as usual. This same scheme can be used
for all removeable media.

The Modem Lights applet might also be better in the tray. I've not had a
modem in years, so I'm not sure about that.

The Stock Ticker is rather large and, I think, should be so. Traying this
would probably be a bad idea.

I'd consider amusements to be tray abuse.

That covers all the 2.x applets I see in Debian.

What should be trayed generally? Anything that shows state in a 24px high
area. Width should also be about 24px, except for the clock.

I don't know if we have the UI to allow activating and deactivating tray icons.


Cheers,
Greg Merchan