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Some of you might know the non-click interface of the Lancelot Menu. IMO, it would be absolutely awesome to be able to have something like this all over KDE.

I found the following text on my hard disk (I had written it a couple of months before), and I thought it would be more useful here on KDE brainstorm than if it stayed on the hard disk without being noticed by anyone
Oh, and please forgive me the extensive use of the non-word "mouseover-thingie", I just can't think of something better
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Ideas for a non-click Interface

On the Panel and on the desktop: Lancelot-like mouseover-thingies, for right click ctrl+mousover or another mouseover thingie.

In the programs: mouseover-thingies for the menu sections, the actions in the menus (and one for closing the menu section) Also in the toolbar, for configuration of the toolbar extra thingie, maybe a bit like the cashew for the panel. Buttons, drop-down lists, radiobuttons etc. should also have mouseover-thingies

In the file manager: Mouseover-thingies on the edges of the icons: one big for opening with the default application, two smaller ones for the two most used other actions and one for the rest of the possible actions (that one would equal a right-click on the icon).

In the start menu: like Lancelot

What about kmousetool? It generates mouse clicks if you do certain things (for instance you can set it to click if you hold your mouse over an icon for a certain length of time).

TheBlackCat wrote:What about kmousetool? It generates mouse clicks if you do certain things (for instance you can set it to click if you hold your mouse over an icon for a certain length of time).

I know about that, but it's just not that easy and convenient to use as Lancelot's no-click interface. IMO Kmousetool is a less-than-ideal solution, mainly designed for people suffering from certain illnesses that make it painful for them to do things like clicking a mouse. The main problem is that it doesn't give me any feedback, and I can accidentally click on a button just by hovering on it. This issue is adressed in Lancelot by a small icon (the mouseover thingie) that appears if you hover on a button.

I'll post a screenshot later.

Here you go, the small circle with a triangle in it is what I'm talking about. You have to hover on it to trigger the action of the button.

blueget wrote:Oh, and please forgive me the extensive use of the non-word "mouseover-thingie", I just can't think of something better

It's called extender. :-P
(Not the same as the plasma extenders).

I think it would be pretty annoying to have no-click activation everywhere in KDE - too easy to "click" on something you didn't intend to. In Lancelot it works since you usually only have two columns, and the extender appear on either side of the items - to the far left or to the far right.

i like it

though i want it to be implemented in other way than lancelot

in my variant

the hotspots (the thingies you stand on) are not all located on the corresponding widgets. instead some of them (ok cancel scroll_up/down put_cursor_in_1st_textbox tab backtab etc) can be set to show up in standardized places on the screen (may be outside the active window) as translucent labels. the standard places for hotspots can be resized and moved around the screen with a settings panel in systemsettings. this makes way for many future hacks around using kde without visible mouse pointer / using pointing technologies that are more exciting but less precise than mouse

hotspots can be motion and direction activated. for example a spot that acts differently depending on the speed and direction in which th mouse bumps into it / the amount of times a mouse bumps into it or travels around it

screen edges can be set up as hotspots for actions outside the active window (tempted to learn building plasmoids to implement this)

Getting ready for touchscreens?

Great

Hans wrote:

blueget wrote:Oh, and please forgive me the extensive use of the non-word "mouseover-thingie", I just can't think of something better

It's called extender. :-P
(Not the same as the plasma extenders).

I think it would be pretty annoying to have no-click activation everywhere in KDE - too easy to "click" on something you didn't intend to. In Lancelot it works since you usually only have two columns, and the extender appear on either side of the items - to the far left or to the far right.

I don't think it would be annoying, of course the size of the elements - buttons etc. - has to be adjusted, they need to be bigger. I think if the extenders are always right of the icon or the text (or always left, that could be made configurable) it would work pretty nicely I think.