Message Tray
The primary goal of the Message Tray is to provide the user with enough information to quickly assess an event but limit the severity and duration of the preemption. Another important goal is to allow but not compel the user to respond to the event. The tray also provides an important reminding function for messages that the user has deferred addressing.
More specific goals include:
- permit the user to stay focused on the primary task
- provide awareness of new notifications
- remind for unseen messages
- direct attention to high priority messages and alerts
- unobtrusive display
- provide a uniform interface for messages, notifications, and alerts
- allow the user to control the information display
- provide a lightweight interface to background operations
Notifications are events that are ephemeral and do not require direct action or response. Messages are events that either require or imply a response or should be acknowledged in some way.
Conceptually each Message comes from a Message Source. Sources of messages may include, at the user's discretion: e-mail, calendar appointments, instant message chat, stock market data, weather advisories, and system alerts. These should map to applications or to the services of the core system itself.
In order to not compel the user to action all Messages (events that request or require action, response, or some form of acknowledgement) should be queued for the user. or Notifications and Messages that do not require acknowledgement or that have alternate indicators should not be queued (eg. A low battery warning does not require a response and the battery level already has an indicator in the System Status Area).
Usage Guidelines
Porting