Legacy Compatibility

Guidelines

The notification area is deprecated in GNOME 3 and shouldn't be used.

The GNOME 3 notification servers, gnome-shell and notification-daemon (for non-3d fallback), support what we are calling notification persistence. This means that notification bubbles won't be transient and require backing with a status icon. This will allow us to drop use of status icons in these cases. An application can detect if the notification server supports persistence by checking the server capabilities. Here's an example.

On the other hand, we'll probably have to add a hint to allow some notifications to remain transient. For example, offline/online buddy status or non-critical battery level warnings, etc.

And some sources need to stay resident in the tray even after an action is invoked. For example, clicking next track in the Rhythmbox notification should not remove the source from the tray.

Setting hints

To set the new 'transient' or 'resident' or other boolean hints, use the notify_notification_set_hint() API, as follows:

  notify_notification_set_hint (notification, "transient", g_variant_new_boolean (TRUE));

Usage of notification area

High Priority

Application

Use/mention of notification area or tray

Recommendation

Status

abrt

Shows an icon with tooltip of message "X has crashed". Launches abrt app on click.

Drop status icon and rely on existing notification. See also GnomeShell/Design/Whiteboards/ProblemReporting

trac 127

brasero

Shows "progress" of current task graphically. Focuses app window on click.

Use MessageTray to indicate status when in background (eg. "Burning PROJECT to disc") or when completed (eg. "PROJECT has been burned to CD").

631957

banshee

Has tray icon that can be right-clicked, scrolled over, and pops up a window when playing and hovered

Same as for Rhythmbox, presumably

645628

deja-dup

Shows an icon during the backup operation. Tooltip shows state (eg. "Preparing..."). Left and right click show a menu of "Show progress" (toggle), "Resume later"

Drop status icon. Use notifications for actions when running in background. See brasero or nautilus.

lp 668160

empathy

Empathy's Contact List has an option under "Preferences > Notifications" to "Show incoming messages in the messaging menu". If checked, there is no icon in the Notification Area. If unchecked, there is an icon in the Notification Area that (a) represents your status, (b) alerts you to new messages by blinking, and (c) has a right-click menu with items (1) Show contact list [toggle], (2) New conversation..., (3) New call..., (4) Status [with status submenu], and (5) Quit. Left-click does nothing other than focus the Contact List window.

Drop status icon and rely on notifications for messages. Rely on App launching and switching to get chat history/buddy window.

631944

epiphany

Shows an icon when downloading files. Click shows or hides the download status window. Right click shows a menu with "Show Downloads" in it.

Use a notification when file downloads are finished.

618443

evolution

New mail notification. Click on icon focuses mail window.

Drop status icon and use notification API. See ../Email

Bug 631731

evolution

Calendar alarm

Drop status icon and use notification API.

633297

evolution

Calendar publishing?

633298

gnome-bluetooth

-

Integrate into the system status area

618312

gnome-control-center

Typing break

Turn typing break into an app and use the notification APIs. Or alternatively a shell extension with a system modal dialog.

Removed in master

gnome-disk-utility

Shown when disks are failing. Tooltip is "One or more disks are failing". Shows a menu with list of failing devices?

Drop status icon and just show notification on failure. Notification can launch disk utility for more information.

Bug 631738

gnome-media

System volume control

Integrate into the system status area

629455

gnome-packagekit

Shows an icon with tooltip "There are 19 updates available".

Drop status icon and use notification persistence.

Bug 631726

gnome-packagekit

Shows a life saver PFD "Package Manager: An internal system error has occurred" - happens when you Quit the update tool before it finishes refreshing package list.

Terminate with extreme prejudice.

gnome-packagekit

The package manager "has messages for you"

Isn't something we want.

Apparently removed from master

gnome-packagekit

Reminder that you need to logout or reboot. Has a drop down menu with those options.

Drop it. Updates that require a reboot should only be preformed during a reboot.

gnome-power-manager

-

Integrate into the system status area

622451

gnome-settings-daemon

Used for a11y settings, display settings, and keyboard layout

Drop display settings. Use notifications for a11y changes. Integrate input language into the system status area

600771

gnome-user-share

Icon shows that you're receiving a file over OBEX PUSH, the icon will stay as long as the notification is visible

Use a notification when you've received a file.

633300

Tomboy / gnote

Running the app adds a status icon automatically. Clicking on the icon shows a menu of Pinned notes, "Start Here", "Search All Notes", a submenu of "Notebooks", and "Create New Note". Right click shows a menu of "Preferences", "Help", "About Tomboy", "Quit".

The status icon mode should be removed. It should behave as a single instance app. A jumplist like function may be added to the app icon in the Overview.

632242 632000

ibus

Integrate with keyboard layout into system status area

600771

krb5-auth-dialog

Applet tab of Preferences has an option to "Show tray icon" (/apps/krb5-auth-dialog/show_trayicon). Click initiate grabbing of credentials. Right click on icon shows menu of "Remove Credentials Cache", "List Tickets", "Preferences", "Help", "About", "Quit".

Drop status icon and support clearing and listing credentials from a System Settings panel. Possibly use a notification to warn the user that credentials are about to expire and allow to renew.

633420

libgnomekbd

Used by gnome-settings-daemon to show layout selector.

Drop and use shell builtins.

Not showing statusicons when running under the shell (using a bit of a hack)

libreOffice

“Tools” > “Options…” > “OpenOffice.org” > “Memory” > “OpenOffice.org Quickstarter” > “Enable systray Quickstarter”

Remove this section, and always behave as if the Quickstarter is turned off.

fd.o 31206

nautilus

File transfer progress meter.

Similar to solutions for download or disc burning progress. Indicate ongoing/background action and alert when completed. See brasero.

631763

network-manager-applet

On click displays a menu with the available networks (be they wireless or wired), an option to disconnect from one being used, ability to connect to a hidden wireless network, create a new one and a menu with VPN connections.

Integrate into system status area.

621707

plymouth

Shows a log viewer tool on click when there are errors during boot.

What is the user supposed to do in response here? Drop this until we have a good solution.

fd.o 30724

policykit-1-gnome

Shows an icon when the session has temporary authorizations. Tooltip says "Click the icon to drop all elevated privileges".

Drop status icon. Possibly offer some way to drop / configure privileges in the System Settings panel.

631761

rhythmbox

When status icon plugin is enabled. Visbility conditions are configurable. Clicking icon toggles visibility of app. Right click shows menu Play, Previous, Next, Show Music Player, Show Notifications, Quit.

Drop status icon and use enhanced Message Tray integration. ../MusicPlayer

630847

seahorse-plugins

Clicking icon toggles visibility of the agent cache window. Right click shows menu of "Clear Cache", "Show Window", "Cache Preferences".

Drop status icon and support clearing the credential cache from the seahorse application.

633424

seahorse-plugins

Shows the signature status of decrypted messages as a notify popup.

setroubleshoot

Tells you about AVC violations. There isn't anything you can do but file a bug.

Drop it and integrate into abrt or similar service.

trac 10

system-config-printer

Shows status of pending print jobs

Drop status icon and use a notification when print jobs are pending, completed, or in error.

trac 216

tracker

When clicking on the icon, a list of data miners is presented. In this list there is an image to the left which indicates the paused or non-paused state. There is also a progress bar which indicates how far through the work load the data miner is. Each miner can be paused/resumed by clicking on it in the menu. From the context menu, tracker-status-icon allows the user to configure the preferences of tracker-miner-fs using the tracker-preferences application.

Drop it.

631955

transmission

Desktop tab in Preferences has an option to "Show Transmission icon in the notification area". The tooltip of the icon shows up and down transfer speeds. Clicking on the icon toggles the visibility of the app. Right click shows a menu of "Show Transmission", "Add File...", "Add URL...", "Pause All", "Start All", "Enable Temporary Speed Limits", "Quit".

Hide option and behave as if unchecked.

trac 3685

vino

Remote Desktop Preferences has a section for "Notification Area" with options to "Always display an icon", "Only display an icon when someone is connected", or "Never display an icon". The icon tooltip tells whether the service is enabled or not. Clicking icon doesn't seem to have an action. Right clicking shows menu "Preferences", "Help", "About"

If this is to be a system component we should integrate this control into the system status area.

631948

xchat

“Quit XChat?” alert has “Minimize to Tray” button.

Remove the button.

xchat

“Alerts” Preferences has row of “Show tray balloons on” checkboxes.

Change “tray ballooons” to FIXME

sf.net 3097842

xchat

“Alerts” Preferences has row of “Blink tray icon on” checkboxes.

When notification area is absent, hide the row of checkboxes, and behave as if all are unchecked.

xchat

“Alerts” Preferences has “Enable system tray icon” checkbox.

When notification area is absent, hide the checkbox, and behave as if it is unchecked.

zenity

"--notification" as an option displays "--window-icon" in the tray with "--text" as a tooltip.

Migrate to the notification API. Use text as the message title and window-icon as notification icon.

Bug 631737

Medium Priority

Application

Use/mention of notification area or tray

Recommendation

Bug

chromium-browser

eclipse

ekiga

Uses icon similar to Pidgin - Shows current status (online/in-call etc.). Left-click toggles between Ekiga being hidden (not on screen and not minimised to Window List) and visible (on screen plus shown in Window List. Right-click shows the options "Help", "About" and "Quit". The icon can not be disabled within Ekiga's preferences dialog.

Use notification API. See Empathy.

evolution-rss

Evolution plugin configuration offers "Show icon in notification area", "Blink icon in notification area", "Show feed icon". Tooltip shows recent feed titles. Clicking the icon is supposed to toggle visibility of the app but it doesn't seem to work here.

gnome-gmail-notifier

gnome-phone-manager

Always shows status with tray icon and tooltip (Connected, Connecting to phone, Message arrived, Not connected). Left-click opens window to send SMS only if "Connected", else nothing happens. Right click shows menu (Send Message, Preferences, About, Quit).

lastfm

Left click shows/hides the application window. Right click displays a context menu with items: Open, basic preferences (My Last.fm Page link, [x] Enable scrobbling, Change user submenu), song-related operations (Share, Tag; Love, Ban; Play/Stop, Skip), and Quit. Song-related items are enabled/disabled depending on whether a song is playing or not.

liferea

Liferea, by default, has an icon in the tray. It shows when RSS feeds are updated, and optionally how many new items exist. Left-click shows/hides application. Right-click shows menu, with options to work offline, update all feeds, open the preferences menu, show/hide Liferea, and quit.

nautilus-dropbox

Doesn’t have an application window per se. Notification icon displays dropbox logo with an overlay icon indicating synchronization status of the dropbox folder. Hover displays two lines: "Dropbox <version>" and the current sync status (e.g. "All files up to date"). Left-click opens the user's dropbox folder in Nautilus. Right-click provides a context menu: "Open Dropbox Folder" (same as left-click), "Launch Dropbox Website", "Recently Changed Files" menu, disabled item indicating used space in online dropbox folder (e.g. "6.7% of 2.5GB used"), disabled item indicating sync status (e.g. "All files up to date"), Help menu (sub-items are Help Center/Tour/Forums), "Get more Space" (opens browser with info about dropbox plans), "Preferences..." (opens prefs app that doesn't appear to be accessible any other way), "Stop Dropbox". Preferences window contains various options, including this checkbox option: "Show system tray notifications".

opera

Allows show and hide as well as a number of other options. Option "opera -notrayicon" not available anymore at least as of version 10.60.

pidgin

When clicked shows/hide buddy list window. If there's a new message, when clicked it jumps to the chat window (very useful feature). On right click it displays a menu which allows to change status, switch off various options (sounds, notifications, buddy list), allows to select accounts, plugins and preferences. Inside Preferences > Interface, there's an option to disable it.

See empathy.

scim

-

See ibus?

usermode

Shows an icon when session has extra authorizations. Clicking on icon shows dialog that says: "You're currently authorized to configure system-wide settings (that affect all users) without typing the administrator password again. You can give up this authorization." Right click shows a menu of "Keep Authorization", "Forget Authorization".

Drop status icon. Possibly offer some way to drop / configure privileges in the System Settings panel. See polkit-gnome.

vagalume

When it starts it adds a status icon automatically. Tooltip shows playing status. Click toggles window visibility. Right click shows menu of "Recommend To...", "Tags", "Add to Playlist", "Love this track", "Ban this track", "Play", "Next", "Preferences", "About", "Quit". Preference dialog's "Misc" tab has a "Close to systray" checkbox.

vlc

"Tools">"Preferences">"Interface tab">"Show an icon in the systray" (Barre système in french). Right click on this icon show a menu with Play, Stop...

wine

Many Windows applications use the system tray (e.g. Spotify). Behavior depends on the specific application.

xchat-gnome

The notification plugin can be configured to display a status icon. Clicking the icon toggles the visibility of the app.

Replace the notification plugin with one that uses a notificaton API.

Low Priority

Application

Use/mention of notification area or tray

Recommendation

Bug

abby

“Edit” > “Preferences” > “Misc” has “Minimize to system tray” checkbox.

When notification area is absent, hide this checkbox, and behave as if it is unchecked.

acetoneiso

“File” > “Options” > “Advanced Options” has “Tray Icon” section with two checkboxes.

When notification area is absent, hide the “Tray Icon” section, and behave as if both checkboxes were unchecked.

alarm-clock

Has always-on alarm clock icon that shows/hides the list of alarms.

Port to a status menu with “Add Alarm…”, “Add Counter…” etc items.

alarm-clock-applet

? (Doesn’t seem to use the notification area, even when an alarm goes off.)

amarok

Has custom status menu, but its icons are broken, “Restore” item does nothing when Amarok is visible, and “Settings” > “Configure Amarok” > “General” > “Show tray icon” checkbox does nothing.

amsn

Uses notification area

ant-phone

? (Doesn’t launch: “You'll need a full duplex soundcard or multiple sound devices compatible and an ISDN card.”)

aqualung

Always-present notification area item that shows/hides the Aqualung windows, and offers basic playback controls.

ario

“Edit” > “Preferences” > “Notification” > “Tray icon” section toggles notification area item that shows/hides the Ario windows, and offers basic playback controls.

artha

“The hot key set for Artha is Ctrl + Alt + W. Press this key combination to call Artha from the system tray. Selecting text in any window and calling Artha will pop it up with the selected text's definitions. If notifications are enabled, instead of popping up, Artha will notify the first definition of the selection. Notifications can be enabled/disabled by right-clicking on Artha's status icon on the system tray and selecting the required option. Pressing Ctrl + Alt + W actually does nothing, and so does right-clicking on the notification area item.

audacious-plugins

“File” > “Preferences” > “Plugins” > “General” > “Status Icon”

avidemux

“Edit” > “Preferences” > “General” > “Use systray while encoding” checkbox hides Avidemux while encoding, showing an animated notification area item instead.

Remove the checkbox, and always behave as if it was unchecked. Consider showing progress in Avidemux’s window icon.

ayttm

Always-present notification area item shows/hides main window, and has a menu for basic IM statuses.

backintime

Only appears when backup is in progress. Left-clicking pops up a dialog of specifically what is being checked or backed up at the moment. Right-clicking does nothing.

bacula

balsa

basket

calibre

"Preferences" > "Preferences" > "interface" > "Enable system tray icon" puts permanent icon in notification area. Clicking sends calibre to fg/bg. Right click menu has options for donate, eject (ebook device), quit. Hover tip shows actions in progress. On closing the app, "calibre will keep running in the system tray. To close it, choose Quit in the context menu of the system tray."

camorama

cb2bib

cellwriter

choqok

Displays the number of unreaded tweets/messages. Clicking shows/hides the main window and clears the unread messages count. Right-clicking shows a menu with items for quick post, update messages, enable/disable update timer, configure program and quit.

Integrate with the messaging menu.

claws-mail-extra-plugins

connman-gnome

cryptkeeper

dalston

deluge

In Edit->Preferences->Interface there is a System tray section for enabling/disabling the system tray icon, which on mouse-over displays current up- and download speeds and limits, on left click displays/hides the application window, and on right click brings up a menu with the following options : Show Deluge, Add torrent, Pause All, Resume All, Download Speed limit and Upload speed limit with predefined values in submenus to choose from, and Quit

desktopnova

drivel

eee-applet

efax-gtk

eiskaltdcpp

elmerfem

esperanza

fatrat

fglrx-installer

fontmatrix

“Edit” > “Preferences” > “System Tray” screen, with “Show Fontmatrix in System Tray” and several other options.

When the notification area is not available, hide the Preferences section, and always behave as if “Show Fontmatrix in System Tray” is unchecked.

fpm2

fqterm

ganyremote

Has an always-on remote controller icon, used to bring up the GUI (left-click) or a context menu (right-click).

gajim

g2ipmsg

gbemol

gcin

geany-plugins

gemanx-gtk2

gigolo

glurp

gmpc

“Music” > “Preferences” > “Notification Area Icon” section with “Enable” checkbox. On left-click, icon toggles showing the GUI, on right-click, has the options Pause (or Play), Stop, Next, Previous, Playlist (same as left-click, toggles GUI visibility) and Quit.

gnome-applets

gnome-mplayer

gnome-mud

gnomeradio

gnotime

gnubiff

gnunet-gtk

gnunet-qt

goldendict

goobox

google-gadgets

gringotts

grsync

gtk2hs

gtk-gnutella

gtrayicon

guake

Guake is a simple drop-down terminal. Left-clicking shows/hides the application. Right-clicking opens a menu, with options to open a preferences menu, open an about dialog, and quit the application.

guayadeque

guile-gnome-platform

gwget

Left-click to show/hide app, Right-click for menu with new download creation, a download list, preferences, and quit

gwget2

hdate-applet

ibm-notes85

Clicks ignored. Hover informs of mail arrival.

imageshack-uploader

iptux

italc

jeex

kaffeine

kcheckgmail

kdeaccessibility

kdebase-runtime

kdebase-workspace

kdebindings

kdeedu

kdegraphics

kdenetwork

KPPP (dialup manager) docks in the tray

kdepim

kdetoys

kdeutils

kdocker

keepassx

kepas

kerneloops

kfritz

kftpgrabber

kgmailnotifier

klogshow

kmess

When clicked shows/hide contact list window. On right click allows to set status, disconnect, configure program, accounts and quit program.

kmldonkey

kmplayer

knemo

koffice

kontrolpack

kpackagekit

The daemon uses a tray icon to show activity. It has been ported to the new tray spec for KPK 0.6

kradio

krusader

kshutdown

ktorrent

Left click shows/hides the application. Right click opens a context menu with some basic preferences, operations, and Quit.

kupfer

Kupfer is an application mimicking the app-launching functionality of Gnome-Do. Left-clicking shows/hides the application. Right-clicking shows a menu, with options to open a preferences window, open a help window, open an about dialog, and quit the application.

kvirc

kvkbd

kvpnc

kx11grab

lablgtk2

lazarus

lernid

libgtk2-perl

libwnck

Monitors windows with the urgency hint set, and display a notification icon for each of them.

licq

linphone

linuxdcpp

lua-gtk

luckybackup

Displays an icon upon start and during simulation and backup.

lxmusic

macopix

mail-notification

Displays an icon on new mail (supports local mbox, maildir, POP3, IMAP, Gmail, Evolution). On left click executes the configured action (e.g. open the mail reader) and a context menu on right click (Open mail reader, Mark mail as read, Update, Properties). Homepage

mangler

Voice chat (ventrillo) client from PPA, will be in archive soonish: displays own icon in tray, icon changes color when the microphone is active (usually because user is pressing push-to-talk button, but also when mic auto-activation is on). Push to talk activation is generally accompanied by a "ding" sound. Clicking the icon brings main mangler window to front, in focus.

minbar

Icon appears once opened and program reduces to tray when closed. Left click brings up the window, right click presents a menu.

monkeystudio

mountmanager

mumble

“Configure” > “Settings” > “User Interface” > “Tray Icon” section with two checkboxes (one of them shown only when “Advanced”)

When notification area is absent, hide the “Tray Icon” section, and behave as if both checkboxes were unchecked.

museek+

musescore

nagstamon

It's the main interface. Click on the icon to open a floating window with data

nuapplet

ogmrip

open-vm-tools

orage

osmo

oss4

padevchooser

parcellite

When launched it goes directly to the tray, without showing anything.

It should show preferences on the first run, and then go to a Status menu (maybe the same of the keyboard layout?)

parcellite

In the preferences: "Actions" tab - ctrl-click on the tray icon to use actions

There's also a keyboard shortcut to use those actions. Remove the reference altogether.

pcmanx-gtk2

psi

psi-plus

pygtk

python-eggtrayicon

Library.

When invoked, print a debug message warning that the notification area is being removed.

python-qt4

Library containing the actual QSystemTrayIcon python bindings, false positive

When invoked, print a debug message warning that the notification area is being removed.

---

qbittorrent

qdacco

qelectrotech

qjackctl

qmmp

qnapi

qorganizer

qstardict

qsynth

qtcreator

qtemu

qterm

qtm

qtscriptgenerator

False positive, this is a library, sort of

---

---

qtsmbstatus

quassel

False positive for ifdef'd compat code

---

---

quicksynergy

Always-present icon. Left-click shows settings, right-click shows menu to open settings or quit.

quitcount

quodlibet-plugins

"Music" > "Plugins" > "Tray Icon"; "Music" > "Plugins" > "Notify"

qutim

qwit

radiotray

Menu on leftclick to choose the station and to turn radio on and off, menu on rightclick to configure radios, display About dialog and quit.

recorditnow

rep-gtk

rgtk2

rsibreak

ruby-gnome2

salasaga

shutdown-qapps

shutter

Left click to open/close app, Right click to use screenshot functions (its purpose)

skrooge

smb4k

smplayer

snd

soundkonverter

speedcrunch

stardict

Left click to minimize/unminimize from tray, right click to stop automatic text scanning or to quit the application

swt-gtk

sylpheed

symphony (IBM Lotus)

Double-Click opens Symphony. Rt-Click: Launch, Exit menu. It's a dll preloader

synce-trayicon

touchfreeze

tucan

"View" > "Preferences" > "Advanced Configuration" has "Close to tray" checkbox. Left click shows the window, right click brings up a menu with the options: "Preferences", "About" and "Quit". It's written in Python and uses the "gtk.StatusIcon()" object to create its tray icon.

twitux

txtreader

uget

update-notifier

valknut

vidalia

virtualbox-ose

wally

webissues

winwrangler

wpa_supplicant

Package includes a wpa_gui that uses the notification area.

xfce4-clipman-plugin

xfce4-notes-plugin

xfce4-power-manager

xfce4-volstatus-icon

xpad

yarssr

Always-present icon in notification area changes colour when new feed items found. Right- and left-click menus. Icon has tooltip.

yate

Bindings

Binding

Bug

vala

633819

notify-python

See Also

Design/OS/MessageTray/Compatibility (last edited 2015-01-10 13:17:59 by OliverPropst)