unity-design team mailing list archive

[Thorsten Wilms <t_w_@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, 2010-01-12 at 13:53 -0600, David Siegel wrote:

> ...Rich Jones suggested curbing the display of all keyboard
> shortcuts in menus.

> (https://bugs.edge.launchpad.net/hundredpapercuts/+bug/493762)

It does look nicer and is less distracting in all cases where you do not
care about the shortcuts. It's a disaster if you are looking for them.
But what is more common? ;)

However, simply never showing them would remove one way users can
discover and be reminded of shortcuts.

>   * How would you feel if only the keyboard shortcut for the highlighted
> menu entry (e.g. the menu entry under the cursor) were shown?

That *might* be a good compromise. Additionally, hitting any meta key
could show them all (not just those with the meta key in question).

But then you would either need to have all the extra space in the menu,
or extend it once you want to show shortcuts (make menu wider or draw
additional box).

To be mentioned just for completeness: fade in after a delay.


Another possibility would be to draw the shortcuts in another color with
less contrast.

-- 
Thorsten Wilms

thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/