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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: KDE Wallet notification
From:       Peter <gostelow () global ! co ! za>
Date:       2009-02-09 14:50:50
Message-ID: 200902091653.54816.gostelow () global ! co ! za
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On Sunday 08 February 2009 14:40, Celeste Lyn Paul wrote:
> On Sunday 08 February 2009 06:34:08 am Maciej Pilichowski wrote:
> > On Sunday 08 February 2009 07:27:09 Peter wrote:
> > > Well another option is to have the notice bring the app to the user
> > > and then return it. All the user need do is click the notice and
> > > enter the password,
> >
> > Notification should not be duplications of the other software. Besides
> > popup is just another way of notifying the user.
> >
> > > > > The notice should appear on top of all other apps, but never
> > > > > over the active (focused) view.
> > > >
> > > > Which is impossible to do in general.
> > >
> > > It is true that a view could cover the entire screen, so
> > > the notice may have to guess where it should appear.
> >
> > So, where should be? -- app takes entire screen and...
>
> Why should it take up the entire screen? This is where we can learn
> something from how Canonical has proposed to handle notifications in
> Ubuntu.
>
> If the user really needs to address whatever event happened (enter
> password) then it should steal focus. If the user needs to know about the
> event but it can wait until the user's attention is back on the
> application, then the app can call for attention in the background (blink
> or something). A lower urgency case handler would be if the user just needs
> to be aware that an application is calling for attention, and so they get
> the popup notification for 3 seconds.. if they miss it there is a log of
> the event or they go to the application and notice it asks for a password.
>
> But this is getting away from the developer's original question.

The question is whether the notice will always popup without interfering with 
the user, for example, by accidently getting the focused view's input. But I 
raised the question, not the developer, because his questions were more about 
design issues than useability (what do you want it to do?, not, how well does 
it work?). 

> I think we need to give the poor KDE Wallet developer an easy solution and
> talk about notifications in a different thread. Why? So the developer has a
> solution NOW because the notification system isnt going to changed anytime
> soon.

The developer already had a simple solution: Display the password dialog, when 
it closes the user's view will refocus. Anything else gets complicated. But 
we rejected it.

>
> Michael,
>
> I think the most popular (and sane) recommendation was for the popup to say
> something along the lines of "[This application] is asking for a password"
> and optionally have a button to view/goto the application (bring it in
> focus).

But focusing the password app causes a permanent state change, which the 
developer's existing design does not do, nor expect. And this, imho, is a 
useability issue of 'least surprise', which we should resolve because we 
reject the developer's solution.

My objection to focusing the password app is that it creates an unwanted 
side-effect. Unless the developer can 'unfocus' the app, this solution may 
create more useability issues than it solves, imho.

I took some time to explain this issue as I saw it, I was not discussing the 
notification system per se. Unfortunately, I have not seen a response from 
Michael, so I have no idea what solution he will implement.

Peter
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