some quick notes on xfce4-power-manager 0.6.4

[Jari Rahkonen]

Mike Massonnet kirjoitti:
> Le Mon, 09 Mar 2009 22:13:45 +0200,
> Jari Rahkonen <jari.rahkonen at pp1.inet.fi> a écrit :
> 
>> Auke Kok kirjoitti:
>>> Jari Rahkonen wrote:
>>>> Mike Massonnet kirjoitti:
>>>>> Le Mon, 09 Mar 2009 17:59:43 +0100,
>>>>> Ali Abdallah <aliov at xfce.org> a écrit :
>>>>>
>>>>>> Auke Kok wrote:
>>>>>>> some notes about xfce4-power-manager -0.6.4:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> - double clicking the systray icon should call the preferences
>>>>>>> window
>>>>>> This is easy to add.
>>>>> The GtkStatusIcon doesn't have a signal to do this easily
>>>>> (double-click), so this is out of scope as a standard use of a
>>>>> notification icon, instead choose by convention the best action
>>>>> for a click. Most apps use this to show/hide the main interface.
>>>>> You could just show the preferences dialog, which is the best
>>>>> convention imho. For instance, wicd does this. Mail-notification
>>>>> lets you choose which action to do like "check up mails", "open
>>>>> mail client" or "show preferencse dialog".
>>>> Wicd actually shows the Connect dialog, not the actual
>>>> preferences. I'd rather see preferences as an option in the right
>>>> click context menu.
>>>>
>>>> The left button could maybe show a different menu with options to
>>>> suspend and hibernate (if these are enabled in the session manager
>>>> settings) and possibly battery information or statistics. I think
>>>> g-p-m has something like this.
>>> very counterintuitive and certainly not what any of the other common
>>> apps do. right-click is for a context menu, and you can certainly
>>> stuff suspend et al in there, but they are already present in the
>>> xfce4-session logout window anyway...
>> I see your point. Don't know about your selection of 'common apps'
>> though, as I rarely see more than two or three notification icons at a
>> time. Most of the time wicd is the only one filling my tray, with the
>> power manager showing up whenever the laptop is running on battery
>> power or charging.
> 
> I had suggest you take a look at the description of GtkStatusIcon.

Nothing new since the last time I read it. What's your point?

>>> I've got 4 applications currently sitting in my systray, ALL pop up
>>> a window on left-click. ALL pop up a context menu with
>>> 'options/preferences, quit, and a few more items on right click.
>> Right, but I still think the right click menu is the correct and only
>> place for the options/preferences option. Do any of those other apps
>> you see in your tray pop up a *preferences* window on left click? I
>> don't think they should, unless frequent fiddling with the
>> preferences is expected. I'd say even doing nothing might actually be
>> preferable.
> 
> The power manager doesn't have anything else than the preferences
> dialog to show, so it would be correct to display it. Can we please
> stop here.
> 
> Wicd was just a bad example where the main interface looks a lot like a
> preferences dialog where you choose the networks you want to connect to.

I'm sorry but there's still one point worth laboring: I don't think
showing an options dialog on left click is any more consistent or
intuitive than doing nothing if your application is a service with no
'main interface' per se. But yeah, it's Ali's baby, so he can do as he
likes.

> Mike

- Jari