New Notification UI

[Alex Faaborg]

[note: cross posting to dev-apps-firefox and dev-usability, let's use
the dev-apps-firefox thread for centralized discussion]

Over the last few weeks I've been working with Matthew and Dolske on a
potential redesign of the notification system in Firefox. These
mockups explain all of the rational and changes:

Full design: http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/newNotification-i1.png

Intermediary step for 3.6: http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/notificationNamoroka-i1.png

Note that some of these mockups build on proposed changes to the
windows theme, you can find more context on that in the previous thread.

Looking forward to hearing everyone's feedback,
-Alex

[Aza]

Hi Alex,

This is looking fantastic. My only real comment is that we should be
expecting extensions/Jetpacks to want to extend and use the notification
system. What are your thoughts on having a third badge next to page/tools
for browser modifications that only appears if there is an extension which
uses it.

-- aza | ɐzɐ --

On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 5:40 AM, Alex Faaborg <faa...@mozilla.com> wrote:

> [note: cross posting to dev-apps-firefox and dev-usability, let's use the
> dev-apps-firefox thread for centralized discussion]
>
> Over the last few weeks I've been working with Matthew and Dolske on a
> potential redesign of the notification system in Firefox. These mockups
> explain all of the rational and changes:
>
> Full design:

> http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/newNotification-i1.png<http://people.mozilla.com/%7Efaaborg/files/20090821-notification/newNotification-i1.png>
>
> Intermediary step for 3.6:
> http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/notificationNamoroka-i1.png<http://people.mozilla.com/%7Efaaborg/files/20090821-notification/notificationNamoroka-i1.png>

>
> Note that some of these mockups build on proposed changes to the windows
> theme, you can find more context on that in the previous thread.
>
> Looking forward to hearing everyone's feedback,
> -Alex

> _______________________________________________
> dev-usability mailing list
> dev-us...@lists.mozilla.org
> https://lists.mozilla.org/listinfo/dev-usability
>

[belt...@mozilla.com]

Wouldn't that add more visual clutter precisely as we're trying to
remove it?

I'd rather that we have a single locus for the "page" speaking to the
user (JS dialogs, page specific options and page-specific Add-ons or
JetPacks) and another for the "broswer" (application updates,
downloaded file alerts, future ability to alert about updated content
elsewhere on the web, JetPacks or Add-ons) but not a third solely for
extensibility.

I think we have the same goal, I just see the page specific locus as
being the site-identity button, and a single additional badge (or
perhaps if we want to get funky, the Firefox logo) as the one for non-
page specific actions. The key is whether the dialog is about the page
in focus or the browser as a whole.

cheers,
mike

On 2009-08-24, at 2:37 AM, Aza <a...@mozilla.com> wrote:

> Hi Alex,
>
> This is looking fantastic. My only real comment is that we should be
> expecting extensions/Jetpacks to want to extend and use the
> notification system. What are your thoughts on having a third badge
> next to page/tools for browser modifications that only appears if
> there is an extension which uses it.
>
> -- aza | ɐzɐ --
>
>
> On Fri, Aug 21, 2009 at 5:40 AM, Alex Faaborg <faa...@mozilla.com>
> wrote:
> [note: cross posting to dev-apps-firefox and dev-usability, let's
> use the dev-apps-firefox thread for centralized discussion]
>
> Over the last few weeks I've been working with Matthew and Dolske on
> a potential redesign of the notification system in Firefox. These
> mockups explain all of the rational and changes:
>
> Full design: http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/newNotification-i1.png
>

> Intermediary step for 3.6: http://people.mozilla.com/~faaborg/files/20090821-notification/notificationNamoroka-i1.png
>

[Alex Faaborg]

> My only real comment is that we should be expecting extensions/
> Jetpacks to want to extend and use the notification system. What are
> your thoughts on having a third badge next to page/tools for browser
> modifications that only appears if there is an extension which uses
> it.

I've actually got a bunch of thoughts about add-ons leveraging these
types of interfaces that I've been meaning to post as well. Right now
notifications off of the page and tools buttons currently speak in
Firefox's voice, and the object they hang off of denotes the subject
of conversation.

So for instance if a page was trying to install an extension or
Jetpack, Firefox would address the user asking if they would like to
modify their browser with a notification off of the Tools button
(tools = acting on the browser).

However I can also see add-ons eventually creating their own buttons
that both contain UI, and address the user with topics related to the
UI contained by the button. For instance, a Test Pilot button could
potentially contain additional controls for managing test pilot, and
also originate notifications about new tests being available for
participation.

-Alex