unity-design team mailing list archive

[Conscious User <conscioususer@xxxxxxx>]

> what's most disturbing to anybody i discussed our bubbles with, is the 
> absence of a simple way to suppress or dismiss them. what's with that? i 
> don't necessarily need a configuration utility or a seperate section 
> within the appearance settings.. an ON/OFF button would suffice for my 
> desktop usage..

The main question here is how much you and "anybody you discussed our
bubbles with" are differentiating "makes sense" with "it has always
been this way". There is a large overlap between those two concepts,
but they are not the same.

The current problems with NotifyOSD come from the fact that a lot of
applications disagree with the idea that notifications should not be
interactive and therefore become broken under it. But the idea itself
makes a lot of sense. If you are moving your mouse away from your work
to close a notification, something is wrong.

> let me also point out, that interaction with bubbles is so often 
> mentioned, because the users have no other way of entering the 
> conversation they are being alarmed about.

Yes, they do. That's precisely what the messaging menu was created for.
The main problem today is not the design itself, but the fact that it
does not degrade nicely when the messaging menu is not present.

> i was reminded of the importance of seperating information and 
> interaction in the design of a UI.
> might this thumb-law of UI design deserve more attention in respect to 
> our bubbles?

Isn't that precisely what's happening? Notification bubbles are
information, not interaction. That's why OSD does not allow
interaction, even dismissal.