Version 1:


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... TdQX0RFZ00


Version 2:


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... mI2OVhRcUk


Version 3:


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... FUyRTlYSzg


Version 4: (Basically what Heiko described)

State 1 (Hover shows the preview button)


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... mRITWNsaFE

State 2 (Pressing the preview button shows the preview, button remains pressed till pressed again to collapse the preview again)


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... 1V0NUhQQ0U


Regarding showing the current selection: I found making the current one blue and bold looks best, other than that I have also tried a blue bar left to the current one as well as a bold dot, but none of that looked good to me.

If you have further ideas I would like to encourage you to grab the SVG's and reallocate items to your liking. That is not difficult, since I have never worked with inkscape I suppose most other people can do it as well.

Kdeuserk,

IMO I'd be happy with any of them - maybe versions 2 & 4 feel a little bit cluttered. I personally think versions 1 & 3 are perfect!

I think that the layout preview on version 4 isn't strictly necessary and adds a bit more clutter (and i'm guessing would make the code more complicated to write & maintain too) so i wouldn't be bothered whether that was or wasn't in there.

One thing - the button to the right of the title 'Keyboard Layout' to access the settings page in system settings has got two sliders on it, IMO the bottom slider looks SO much better (and it's clear what it is - no more mistaking it for an arrow!) now that you've made the circle hollow rather than the solid dot on the top slider. Is there a reason you've left the top slider solid?

I've always thought it would be great to have a button design that shows 'click this and you'll be taken to a page in SySe' and I think that button's perfect.

ken300 wrote:now that you've made the circle hollow rather than the solid dot on the top slider. Is there a reason you've left the top slider solid?

I did not design that button, it is the official one used by other applets in plasma 5.1 too. The one I used before was official too (it was the one from the 5.0 release).

Excellent!

As you might be able to tell, i've been away a while.

david_edmundson wrote:Grumpy Maintainer Time.
If this is going to be in 5.1 it has to be merged and working by Thursday.

Otherwise it'll have to wait to 5.2.
(https://techbase.kde.org/Schedules/Plasma_5)

I think we should try to get it into 5.1, so we should decide on a variant for the initial release now (I assume one without preview function for now, for feasibility's sake).
I don't know how easy the "show the language name in the original language" feature would be to implement. If it's difficult, we can live without it for the first release.

I think we already have enough material for a solid first release, nice-to-haves can come in 5.2.

I like version 1 because it's very easy to scan due to the column layout, but the others would work as well.
Let's say we leave the discussion open for the evening. If we have not settled on one variant by tomorrow morning (Europe time), myriola can just pick one (since none of them are bad anyways).

Myriola: Is it feasible to get the Plasmoid ready by Thursday with the input you have from us?

The blue text marking the current selection is good IMO. And the layouts all look good, but I think 1 or 3 is best. One question though:

What happens if the name of the language is (too) long?

And finally, I still don't think there is enough room to have a preview inline. If there is to be a preview, it should be as an... OSD, was it?

colomar wrote:
I think we should try to get it into 5.1, so we should decide on a variant for the initial release now (I assume one without preview function for now, for feasibility's sake).
I don't know how easy the "show the language name in the original language" feature would be to implement. If it's difficult, we can live without it for the first release.

I think we already have enough material for a solid first release, nice-to-haves can come in 5.2.

I like version 1 because it's very easy to scan due to the column layout, but the others would work as well.
Let's say we leave the discussion open for the evening. If we have not settled on one variant by tomorrow morning (Europe time), myriola can just pick one (since none of them are bad anyways).

Makes great sense to me colomar.

I'll prefere also version 1 because it is well structured and clear visualized.

kdeuserk wrote:Version 1:


SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... TdQX0RFZ00

Okay, so this is the VDG's design suggestion, then, without the name in original language for now if that adds too much work.

Myriola, does that provide enough information for you to implement it?

I've just had a thought that could make the layout switcher look a little cleaner & more polished.

When you're adding a new keyboard layout in SySe you can define a label for it (the abbreviation that appears in the mockups in the square brackets and within the square System tray icon). That label can be up to 3 characters long and it could cause problems if that label's 3 letters long and not 2 like in the mockups - it could make the layout switcher not look as nice as it does in the mockups. As far as i can see there's 2 solutions to ensure things continue looking super-polished no matter what label a user chooses for their keyboard:

1 - Simply put a bit more horizontal white space between the columns ('[FA]', 'Farsi' & ' (زبان فارسی)') so that whether the label in the square brackets is 1 letter or 3, the columns still look nicely spaced out, at the moment they would start to get a bit close to each other with 3-letter labels and it starts to look a little cluttered. I'm not sure how to deal with the square system tray icon - maybe just scale the letters down or stretch the square horizontally so that it becomes a rectangle (or does it have to be square?) to fit the label inside.

2 - Change SySe to that you can only define a label for the keyboard layout of 2 letters - but i guess that won't give enough combinations of different letters for all the different keyboard layouts that exist so maybe not the best idea!

ken300 wrote:2 - Change SySe to that you can only define a label for the keyboard layout of 2 letters - but i guess that won't give enough combinations of different letters for all the different keyboard layouts that exist so maybe not the best idea!

I don't think two letter do not allow enough combinations: Alone letters from A-Z allow 26*26 combinations, that would be 676 combinations. I read that currently there are about 196 countries in the world, even if every country had 3 different layout variants there would be enough combinations.

If the keyboard labels could be limited to 2 letters then that would solve what to do about trying to squeeze 3 letters into the nice square system tray icon on the mockups.

I suspect though that if there are 676 possible combinations and around about 200 countries - a few countries are going to end up with the 2 letters for their label that don't make alot of sense. It could end up like the periodic table where the abbreviations don't have much to do with the name of the elements and it could be a bit confusing.

I think we should be careful to avoid is the 'it's confusing unless you already know what you're doing in KDE' syndrome

This is what it would look with 3 letters:



SVG: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... 28ya1pfRGs

I hope it is possible to manage to make it with two letters.

EDIT: It seems there is an ISO standard for two letter abbreviations: http://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/ctycodes.htm

I would prefer № 1, but including the preview.

Hi, guys!

I am very sorry if i miss something obvious, but i am not getting it - the OSD popping out when i switch keyboard layout - how can i turn it off?
I'm sorry but it is very annoying, because i switch to and from russian/english and i look at the screen while typing and there it comes right in the middle of the screen, distracting from looking at what i type now.
I'm sure there are lot's of people, who would find this feature exciting (i think the author is the first one to be excited, hehe: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7d7A1xVBWo), but an option woul be reeeealy nice.
I am using gentoo, Plasma 5.3.0, installed from kde overlay today.

Once again - i am very sorry if i miss something.
Thank you!

P.S. i have even disabled "configure layouts" in settings, and set up layouts using setxkbdblahblah, hoping Plasma will "forget" about layout, but OSD is still here.