Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

I'd like to start a conversation about how best to present to the user how they can control rotation in various apps.

With the CSSU, rotation and portrait is becoming more and more common. Existing (open-source) Nokia apps are getting portrait mode programmed into them, and community apps are also being encouraged to add portrait mode.

But, there are some occasions when you don't want apps to rotate, and you want to lock them into landscape or portrait mode. At the moment, different apps present this option to the user in different ways. For example:

• SeriesFinale: Menu, Settings, Screen Rotation: Automatic, Portrait, Landscape
• gPodder: Menu, Settings, Display orientation: Automatic, Landscape, Portrait
• Nokia Phone app: Menu, Turning control, Display orientation: Portrait, Landscape, Automatic
• Microb: Menu, Options, Settings, Enable rotation tickbox
• Panucci: Menu: Automatic, Landscape, Portrait

It seems to me that it would be nice to be consistent, so that users could move between apps and still be able to quickly change rotation, without having to hunt through differently-named settings.

I don't know about anyone else, but I like it when the rotation control is easily and quickly accessible, so Panucci's method of having it directly in the menu is great, rather than having it hidden in a settings dialog. However, I realise that many apps cannot do that, as their menu is already crowded.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

http://talk.maemo.org/showpost.php?p...postcount=1369

For now, it's only Landscape / Auto orientation, but a portrait lock is planned.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

how to put the media player to that status menu@@?
And there are auto orientation, will coming in next version CSSU?

thanks

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

And then you have apps like mine which Ctrl+o will either toggle between forced portrait/landscape mode or enable/disable auto-rotation, depending on the app.

More of a matter for CSSU but I tend to favor locked orientations because apps optimize for the new orientation or even do automatic reflow, slowing down rotations even more (fennec being the worst for me but even my own apps are annoying). This was brought up before (mailing list? bmo?) but it was decided it was a dev's responsibility. I did a first crack at it in my app but ran into problems. It'd be nice if there was a way for apps in the background to not get new window/desktop dimensions until they are activated (which could cause a rotation back so no reflow should be seen)

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

The way it should work is as follows:

1. It should be a control panel applet called 'Application Rotation' or something similar.

2. The applet should present the following selectable options:

a. "Allow the following applications to rotate" (whitelist)

b. "Allow all applications to rotate except for the following" (blacklist).

3. The applet should present a list of applications with add/remove options for the list where users can control what applications are in the list (possibly similar to AppMeFo).

KISS.

-DJ

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Thanks MAG. A system-wide widget is a very interesting idea, and certainly would solve the problem of different apps presenting the setting to the user in different ways.

I worry slightly that a system-wide widget may not allow users to control rotation on a per-app basis. For example, maybe a particular app technically supports two different orientations, but the user prefers to lock that app into one orientation. In my case, I like to lock the Phone app into portrait (as that is how I like to hold the phone when using that app, and find the time it takes to rotate annoying if I accidentally change how I hold the phone), but I like to lock Microb into landscape (as I dislike the reduced functionality in portrait mode, and again, dislike it when it rotates accidentally).

Have you got plans to help in that kind of situation? Does the widget have an API that application developers can hook into?

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Thanks Danny, that sounds like a good idea. It would be good if the user could quickly access a way to change the setting on the current (topmost) app. Maybe MAG's system area widget could store a setting per-app (assuming there's a way to find out what the topmost app is), which would modify the lists you mention. There could still be a control panel (i.e. Settings app) applet to allow an overview and editing of the different lists.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

I like the idea, except that the "whitelist" is unnecessary - everything not on the blacklist would allow rotation.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

For example with Fennec, I get frustrated when it rotates from landscape to portrait and back when I do not want to.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

A whitelist works better since a blacklist would make the rotation flags that devs are setting redundant, thus breaking apps that the dev wants to show in a state on purpose.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

MohammadAG: I just realized I never commented on this in the main thread, but I actually really don't like the idea of sticking it into the status menu. (Personally, coming from WIndows and the N900, I don't exactly need literal consistency, and I think any move that makes users feel justified in wanting unilateral 1-to-1 consistency is bad sociologically, but to me, the very idea of "it's in the settings, with a landscape, portrait, or autorotate option" is beautifully cohesive and consistent, and anything more is just anti-brain-using encouragement for users.)

Anyway, back to the main point, I can understand the want for a completely unified interface, but I don't personally like a status menu applet (I really like my status menu as is, and I already hate organizing the priorities of my applets to get the optimal access to the menu options I want at any given time, adding another guaranteed-to-always-be-there system applet would just mean more fiddling... possibly every CSSU install.). At least, please make it disable-able, or uninstallable in the settings. (There really is a need to watch that you don't push too much out through the CSSU, or if you do, don't cross link them to be completely dependent on each other, preventing uninstallation.

At the same time, can't it just be put in the normal repositories, instead of being pushed with the CSSU, and at the worst, make it depend on the CSSU metapackage if it absolutely has to have some elements of the CSSU present?

Except if you only want 2 apps to rotate, you don't want to keep adding every single program you use to the blacklist, and vice versa. Also, it shouldn't even be a black OR white list, it can be both. Apps not in either one are allowed to default to their normal behavior, while the 'blacklist' allows forcing into either always landscape or always portrait.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Nice work on the CSSU for sure, I have to agree... However, seems like the CSSU is now 463 Pages long and still growing... and I quite tired out trying to search about how to use the blacklist and the whitelist (seems like whitelist is recently implemented as per the changelog of CSSU). Which file actually controls the blacklist whitelist behaviour for apps? If someone would be kind enough to share, it will be a great help... Thanks in advance.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

/usr/share/hildon-desktop/transitions.ini, on the bottom of this file you can add a row (if its not allready there) like this:
blacklist = appname1 appname2
or
whitelist = appname1 appname2

example "whitelist = osso-browser" or "blacklist = mediaplayer"

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

For a list of Programs name, you can check this link: http://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=76377

It's a work in progress!

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Question:

Does "Ctrl+Shift+R" throw any DBUS calls? If yes, it could be used to add/remove an app from the (white/black)list.

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Thx to Boemien & dekkelkamp, did it for blessn900 and ati85 (had to use this for almostTI)

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

I can't open the transitions.ini with leafpad or vim it doesnt show me anything??

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Blacklist rotation

- Install Leafpad
- open X-terminal
- become root
- type leafpad /usr/share/hildon-desktop/transitions.ini
- leafpad opens
- edit file at the bottom
- blacklist = the-app-you-want-to-be-blacklisted (list by Boemien)
- save, close and reboot

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Which has higher priority? blacklist or whitelist?

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

Hi all,

I have encountered a problem after adding "image-viewer" to the blacklist in my transitions.ini file.
After a reboot the phone will no longer respond properly. I can only access one home screen and it looks like all the icons, widgets and shortcuts I have are displayed on top of each other. It renders the phone useless.

I can't find a way to put back the original transitions.ini file, not via the terminal or via the pc with SSH.

Does anyone know what to do, besides a reflash (I would really dislike that...)?

Re: Rotation control within apps - how best to present choice to user?
 

I prefer to leave micro b without rotation enabled in its settings and allow cssu to "force" it ...then I have the option to toggle full screen in portrait and close it while in portrait which I cannot do when rotation is enabled in the settings.

I believe that you can/should only use one and not both.