Re: [Usability] markup in the statusbar messages, why not?

[Bastien Nocera <hadess hadess net>]

On Mon, 2004-09-27 at 17:10 +0100, Calum Benson wrote:
> On Mon, 2004-09-27 at 01:54, Alan Horkan wrote:
> 
> > If there are reasons against using Markup on status bar messages (and if
> > anyone can find a specific refernce to it in the HIG) I would be
> > interested to hear that so as to help the Inkscape developer avoid any
> > problems or at least manage any known issues.
> 
> I don't believe there's ever been a guideline to that effect in the
> HIG.  
> 
> To be honest I can't think of any huge arguments against it (other than
> the technical ones, like translation difficulties), in cases where it
> genuinely improved legibility, provided we had guidelines for regulating
> its usage.  However, I have to admit I can't think of any statusbar-type
> messages off the top of my head that would be improved by it; they
> shouldn't exactly be verbose.
> 
> If the markup is just being used to try and draw attention to the
> message, though, that's a different matter-- if it's important to demand
> attention, then the status bar isn't the place for it.  (And I think
> there is a guideline somewhere that says that.)

The question isn't why you wouldn't want markup in the statusbar, but
why you would. As the statusbars aren't supposed to have any important
messages, I don't see the point of having messages in bold or italics in
the statusbar. And if the font is too small/not readable, you can
increase the system font size, or tweak it just for the statusbar in the
gtkrc.

In all cases, I don't see a reason at all for it...

---
Bastien Nocera <hadess hadess net>