I guess Alex forgot to make it pretty...

Right now there's no option. We can maybe add one in 5.1, but I'd rather we tried to find a way to make it less annoying rather than instantly trying to find a way to turn it off.

Thanks for the reply, David!

If you want my opinion what you could do is one of the following:
- give an option to control size and position
- give an option to make it more/less transparent
- (?) detect sequential switches and ignore then
- an option to turn it off

let me explain the last. i, myself, do not use and layout indicator, no flag, label, no nothing. back in the past i used to bind scroll lock led to light up when in non-english layout, but i just caught myself never looking there at all. i simply remember, what layout is it now, even if i get way to make some tea and return after a while.
and i belive there are some guys like me out there, i've seen people describilng the same on linux.org.ru.
i'm not saying i'm _that_ important, i'm just trying to say that there probably are some guys who would like an option to turn it off.

for example - i use all non-alphabetical symbols in english layout, because i don't like it, when they change they places in russian layout, espetialy "," - you have to hold shift to enter ",", so i use to switch layout a lot.
example: имя[switch],[switch] мама мыла раму[switch]:-)[switch]

p.s. i can't make you do it - you are the developers and stuff, it's just like - if you have 100 man and 1 woman in your company - would it be sufficient to close women's restroom, since like practicaly noones using it?

Cheerilee,

I might have misunderstood what this thread's all about in which case someone please correct me!

If you've got multiple keyboard layouts configured then, in the System Tray will be a rectangular icon to indicate which of those layouts you're using (the grey rectangle with 'DEU' in it in the last mockup that kdeuserk posted). If you left click that then the pane above the taskbar in that mockup will appear, allowing you to switch layouts using the mouse. That pane would also appear if you clicked any of the other System Tray icons, but the contents of the pane would change according to which icon you'd clicked. I have requested that you can switch layouts quickly using the scroll wheel on the System Tray icon so hopefully that will happen too!

I assume that the ability to switch layouts with keyboard shortcuts will remain - in which case i also assume that this pane above the taskbar won't appear when you switch in that way (i also assume that if i use the scroll wheel to switch layouts by scrolling over the 'DEU' icon the pane won't appear either but i could always be wrong!).

Hopefully i'm right about all that, if not i apologise for causing any added confusion!

Is the intention to still have an OSD like in the youtube video that Cheerilee posted - if we've got the System Tray icon to permanently show which layout's selected is there any need?

ken300 wrote:Is the intention to still have an OSD like in the youtube video that Cheerilee posted - if we've got the System Tray icon to permanently show which layout's selected is there any need?

Good question: Ideally from a user's point of view, there would be either the OSD or the Plasmoid, both at the same time are not needed. Would it be possible to suppress the OSD if the Plasmoid is there?

Hi, ken!

yeah, i'm aware of the tray icon*, i was talking only about the OSD which appears in the middle of the screen.
i probably should make a screenshot.

*actualy icon doesn't appear in my tray if i set up kde to switch layout. it may be bad packaging, or i might done something wrong when building plasma, but i don't care, since i do not use the icon.

screenshot: http://img.5cm.ru/view/i4/yAuK.png

cheerilee wrote:screenshot: http://img.5cm.ru/view/i4/yAuK.png

Jeez, that thing is huge! Okay, one step to making it less annoying could be to make it much more subtle, i.e. leave out whatever image is actually supposed to be shown there but is apparently missing on your system.

That one's just crazy, but I think it would be good to leave it out altogether.

On Kubuntu there's no OSD when changing keyboard layouts however. Is that the default KDE behaviour?

colomar wrote:Jeez, that thing is huge! Okay, one step to making it less annoying could be to make it much more subtle, i.e. leave out whatever image is actually supposed to be shown there but is apparently missing on your system.

do you know, where it tries to search for the image? i can try putting something there ...

cheerilee wrote:

colomar wrote:Jeez, that thing is huge! Okay, one step to making it less annoying could be to make it much more subtle, i.e. leave out whatever image is actually supposed to be shown there but is apparently missing on your system.

do you know, where it tries to search for the image? i can try putting something there ...

Imho it should not search for an image anywhere outside the breeze plasma theme folder. There is a "keyboard_layout.svgz" in the plasma 5.1 breeze theme. This is what it should use.
Link to the mentioned svg: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... WpNaDdNYnM

colomar wrote:Jeez, that thing is huge! Okay, one step to making it less annoying could be to make it much more subtle, i.e. leave out whatever image is actually supposed to be shown there but is apparently missing on your system.

Hm ... wouldn't removing the "image" make it inconsitent with other osd's (like brightness)?
With a beautiful icon it would certainly look good and it should not be too subtle.

okay, guys, one more thing, regarding the OSD... if you have configured kwin to have focus under mouse it steels focus (if it happenes to appear under the mouse pointer) . so happens something like:
> typing typing typing [switch, focus lost] now you are typing into outer space ...

inb4: there are different options for focus-under-mouse in kwin:
- focus directly under the pointer "oldscool" version. its complete hell - you can't type anything unless you remember to keep you pointer somewhere inside the window you are typing to, but outside the probable osd attack sector.
- focus under the pointer with a delay. this is better, but still issues.
1. optical mice are very sensitive, mine can move if i am just looking at it, so if you are typing, switched layout, osd appears under the pointer, a light breeze comes thought the window ... focus lost.
2. if you switch to a window and then switch layout the osd may be detected as a window you actually meant to switch to, because your pointer was over the window you really meant to switch to less then the delay. let me provide an example:
you got a message to an im.
you switch to im window and instantly switch layout, because you want to talk in your native alphabet.
the osd appears and, since you were "over" the im window for a not so long time, osd is now considered focused.
you can't type in im.

p.s. please don't think i want to holywar this thing or whatever, i just hope my thoughts may be helpfull (and hope you'll add an option to turn it off )

kdeuserk wrote:Imho it should not search for an image anywhere outside the breeze plasma theme folder. There is a "keyboard_layout.svgz" in the plasma 5.1 breeze theme. This is what it should use.
Link to the mentioned svg: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... WpNaDdNYnM

thanks!

that's what i have in gentoo:

Code: Select all

rakul@lucky-star ~ $ find /usr/ -name keyboard_layout.svgz
find: `/usr/portage/distfiles/svn-src/.subversion/auth': Отказано в доступе
find: `/usr/share/polkit-1/rules.d': Отказано в доступе
/usr/share/plasma/desktoptheme/default/icons/keyboard_layout.svgz
find: `/usr/lost+found': Отказано в доступе
rakul@lucky-star ~ $


errors say "access denied", disregard them.
so looks like i have some kind of a default image. i'll try looking for breeze plasma theme directory, you mentioned, to check out if i can put it there.

Will the OSD show up if I have per-application keyboard layouts?

cheerilee wrote:

kdeuserk wrote:Imho it should not search for an image anywhere outside the breeze plasma theme folder. There is a "keyboard_layout.svgz" in the plasma 5.1 breeze theme. This is what it should use.
Link to the mentioned svg: https://drive.google.com/uc?export=down ... WpNaDdNYnM

thanks!

that's what i have in gentoo:

Code: Select all

rakul@lucky-star ~ $ find /usr/ -name keyboard_layout.svgz
find: `/usr/portage/distfiles/svn-src/.subversion/auth': Отказано в доступе
find: `/usr/share/polkit-1/rules.d': Отказано в доступе
/usr/share/plasma/desktoptheme/default/icons/keyboard_layout.svgz
find: `/usr/lost+found': Отказано в доступе
rakul@lucky-star ~ $


errors say "access denied", disregard them.
so looks like i have some kind of a default image. i'll try looking for breeze plasma theme directory, you mentioned, to check out if i can put it there.

No I meant "It should" the other way: I do not know what it is actually looking for (and don't have git atm to look at the code), only expressed my opinon where the osd should get the icon from, nevertheless what it currently implements.

veqz wrote:Will the OSD show up if I have per-application keyboard layouts?

it appears every time the layout is switched, no matter what configuration you have.

kdeuserk, ah i see, thank you anyway!

If it's correct that if you've got more than 1 keyboard layout then you should have a System Tray icon to access the keyboard layout switcher, i've got a suggestion.

Instead of having an OSD to show when the layout is switched, what about animating the System Tray icon (if that's possible) to give a bit of feedback without being disruptive. I was thinking of having the System Tray icon animated either so that it pulses a bit when the layout is changed or so the icon's background changes colour briefly or something.

The colour idea would need the colour to be changed to suit different themes.