Re: [Ayatana] Unity and tooltips

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx wrote on 03/11/10 23:08:
>...
> On Wed, Nov 3, 2010 at 17:49, Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
>...
>> Vishnoo wrote on 17/10/10 11:39:
>...
>>> Is there a reason Unity's Launcher has tooltips for applications and
>>> places? [While Application icons could be considered as
>>> unrecognizable, Places icons are our custom icons so they should at
>>> least be a bit recognizable. Still not sure how these tooltips are
>>> more important...]
>>
>> For the most part, menu title icons convey pretty simple ideas.
>> Network, sound, keyboard, power. And they stick around for a long
>> time, so you can learn them.
>>
>> Launcher items sometimes are simple items, but sometimes complex ones.
>> And often they don't stick around as long. For instance, you might
>> install a bunch of free programs that do the same thing, to compare
>> them before keeping just one, and their icons may look alike. That
>> makes text labels more useful for them.
>
> i'd suggest going through the Ayatana Indicator Menus for cases of
> mutual exclusion.
> If you e.g. remove "Available" from the Me Menu and display
> [ON|OFF] Chat
> [ON|OFF] Busy Mode
> [ON|OFF] People
> instead.
> "Stand By" aka AFK aka Away would be an automatic Presence state that
> fades slow enough for the user to actually notice.

That's an interesting way of solving the problem of how to set a
"do-not-disturb" mode without going online. However, it would be slower
in going from offline to any state other than the one you'd previously
been in. It also wouldn't allow for any other IM statuses, e.g. "Away"
or "Invisible".

Maybe there is a variation of your idea that would avoid those problems.

> I'm mentioning this in the context at hand, because you need less
> explanatory text i.e. text labels, if you have dynamic menu items like
> [on|off] toggles¹ for example or mutually exclusive items such as
> "connect|disconnect", "show|hide" or "maximize|restore" or
> "mute|unmute"

I don't see what that has to do with tooltips for applications, places,
or menu titles.

> Contact List itself would be more useful if one could dock it to a
> desktop corner and remove the window decoration.

I don't think that has anything to do with tooltips for applications,
places, or menu titles either. I suggest proposing it to the Empathy
developers. (Maybe attach a screenshot of the equivalent option in Adium.)

>                                                  At least " Context
> Menu Information|Edit" should open a docked information field, instead
> of that currently existing tooltip which obscures the very list i'm
> trying to look at aggressively upon mouse over imo..

I agree with the desire to tame the massive tooltips. But it would be
counterintuitive to have to choose an "Edit" menu item just to see
someone's account name.

Perhaps the problem could instead be fixed partly by reducing the amount
of stuff in the tooltip (no need to repeat information that's already
visible), and partly by positioning it alongside the contact list
instead of over top of it.

>                                                      The greatest bug
> is that Contact List's tooltips afford urls in blue, underlined, i.e.
> for interaction, but you can't click on them, because they are
> non-interactive tooltips.

Have you reported it?

> Tooltips are more useful if they are interactive, that's why i like the
> term you chose: text labels. And a label is usually beside it's parent
> button, not obscuring other buttons. Imagine doorbells: they have
> name-labels attached to them, usually sideways, not obscuring other
> buttons in the list.
>
> Or do you mean something else with text labels?

Vish asked about tooltips for applications and places vs. menu titles.
Your reply, about "semantic ontology capable software technology",
"scalable technologies", "conventionalized language", "visual
superlanguage", and a "highly elitarian form of communication", gave me
a headache. As treatment, I set myself the challenge of answering Vish's
question about tooltips, using only words of one or two syllables.

- -- 
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/
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