Thoughts about statusbar

[todd rme]

On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 9:41 PM, David Edmundson
<david at davidedmundson.co.uk> wrote:
> 2011/10/25 Aurélien Gâteau <aurelien.gateau at canonical.com>:
>> Le 25/10/2011 11:32, Martin Gräßlin a écrit :
>>>
>>> On Tuesday 25 October 2011 15:37:20 David Edmundson wrote:
>>>>
>>>> On Tue, Oct 25, 2011 at 3:35 PM, Alex Fiestas<afiestas at kde.org>  wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> On Tuesday, October 25, 2011 11:57:33 AM Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> yes; as well as sometimes just saying "that information is not worth
>>>>>> it".
>>>>>> the kmail example is a great one. i do not care what column and line i
>>>>>> am
>>>>>> on and spell checking should be shown in the toolbar if at all.
>>>>>
>>>>> More conservative and globally-aplicable would be to add a toggle to
>>>>> show/hide statusbar per app/window in the same way almost app do with
>>>>> the
>>>>> menubar. By default this option will be set as hidden but if some user
>>>>> want to be able to see the column number, she/he will be able to set it
>>>>> as shown again.
>>>>
>>>> Is plasma-devel really the right mailing list for something that
>>>> affects every app, and nothing in plasma?
>>>
>>> which other list do you think is appropriate for Workspace related
>>> discussions?
>>
>> What about kde-usability@?
>>
>>> And yes this is clearly Workspace and not application related. We as the
>>> workspace define how an application has to look like and how it has to
>>> behave.
>>
>> The statusbar is inside the application window, so I disagree this is a
>> workspace issue.
>>
>
> KDE Usability is the mailing list I had in my mind when I wrote it. I
> didn't mean do distract from the focus of a thread I think is quite
> important.
>
> Anyway, given I've decided I should pay more attention to plasma and
> get away from just hacking constantly on one project, to make up for
> it here is a breakdown of statusbars the most commonly used apps in
> KDE. This was made with a fresh account with no settings altered.
>
> General apps
> ---
>
> Dolphin: Has a statusbar. Uses it for folder summaries, file
> information when mouse is over an icon  as well as the icon size
> slider.

The drive space information could probably be merged into the place
panel (have the drive currently being browsed have a larger free space
bar with the information currently in the statusbar, could also be
done on other devices on hover).  That only helps with the places
panel is enabled and visible, though.  It could also go in the address
bar, but it would likely require taking up some of the space currently
allocated to the address.

The file-specific information could be similar to rekonq, shown in a
small overlay in one of the corners.  This would only be needed when
the information panel is not enabled and not visible, would it be
possible to detect this and only show it if it is needed?

> Dragon Player: Shows filename of currently playing item, as well as
> elapsed/remaining time.
> Time remaining/elapsed could be merged into the slider. Filename could
> be shown in the window title.

I think both of these changes would be improvements.

> Okular: No statusbar

Mine has a status bar with the current page number and next/previous
page buttons.  This seems to waste a lot of space, any way to put this
in the toolbar instead?

> KCalc: Shows if in normal mode Degrees or Radians etc.
> Only uses a very small amount of the statusbar, but it is important information.

At least for me this is also shown in the numrical display, so it is
redundant.  Further, in all the modes it is relevant, the degrees or
radians display and the number mode display are also shown in radio
buttons, so they are redundant in the numerical display as well.

> Ark: Shows tooltips as you mouseover icons in the toolbar, as well as
> extraction progress
> This first part of the behaviour is very inconsistent with every other
> app, so should really be stopped.

Progress could either be displayed in a dialog or in one of the lower
corners of the window.

> KMail: Says "Ready" most the time. Used to show the progress of tasks,
> along with errors.

Once again could probably the progress bar in the lower corner of the
window when needed and nothing otherwise.

> Akregator: Shows when fetching feeds. Also displays links in the web content.
> Both these pieces of informaiton need to be displayed somewhere

Once again, can go in one of the lower corners.

>  - Shows current channel (pointless, tab bar is visible)
>  - number of people in the channel
>  - server
>  - lag

The server, and lag if it is useful, can probably be displayed in the
title bar.  The number of people in the channel might be better above
or below the nick list.

> KNetwalk: shows the number of moves, the time elapsed and the difficulty level.
> This is essential information to the game, and needs to go somewhere.

Might be better in the toolbar (especially the difficulty) or the titlebar.

-Todd