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Stop. Just stop. This is why we can't have nice things. Of course your application's icon should always be visible in the notification area. Everyone thinks th

by teovall 12y ago

Stop. Just stop. This is why we can't have nice things. Of course your application's icon should always be visible in the notification area. Everyone thinks their application should always be visible. Your application should also always be pinned to the user's taskbar and start menu and should have an icon on the Desktop. It should start at Windows startup and pop up notifications randomly about insignificant things the user doesn't need to take action on. Your application should also be topmost at all times. Even more topmost than other application's topmost windows. Here's a great article about why you shouldn't do this: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/11/01/922449.aspx http://blogs.msdn.com/b/oldnewthing/archive/2006/11/01/92244...

alediaferia 12y ago
I see your point. And I agree with it. I'm not suggesting to override user preferences. But there are some specific cases when a tray icon application loses most of its functionality from disappearing. The Windows API could at least let the developer know when the icon gets hidden: this way the user could be presented with a one-time dialog that informs about the user experience change that happens when hiding the icon. Or, this could be an app permission requested to the user. Just my 2 cents of course.
- teovall 12y ago
  Such as? By default, notifications will still be shown for hidden icons. Notifications are the way urgent, actionable items should be presented to the user. If something isn't urgent and actionable, why is it so important that it be shown to the user? It should be up to the user to decide if and when they want to see it.
  - alediaferia 12y ago
    Well IIRC tray icon notifications on Windows will only be shown for a limited amount of time. What if the user wasn't at the PC at the time?
gus_massa 12y ago
This article is interesting but evil. It got my upvote, but I hope the Windows team disables the loophole in the next release.

by teovall 12y ago

alediaferia 12y ago

I see your point. And I agree with it. I'm not suggesting to override user preferences. But there are some specific cases when a tray icon application loses most of its functionality from disappearing. The Windows API could at least let the developer know when the icon gets hidden: this way the user could be presented with a one-time dialog that informs about the user experience change that happens when hiding the icon. Or, this could be an app permission requested to the user. Just my 2 cents of course.

teovall 12y ago
Such as? By default, notifications will still be shown for hidden icons. Notifications are the way urgent, actionable items should be presented to the user. If something isn't urgent and actionable, why is it so important that it be shown to the user? It should be up to the user to decide if and when they want to see it.
- alediaferia 12y ago
  Well IIRC tray icon notifications on Windows will only be shown for a limited amount of time. What if the user wasn't at the PC at the time?

gus_massa 12y ago

This article is interesting but evil. It got my upvote, but I hope the Windows team disables the loophole in the next release.