As a long-term gnome user with an extremely busy calendar, I often lean on the clock/calendar/appointments area, and over time i’ve noticed a few things that bother me about it that I think could be improved.
Before opening a feature request or anything, I wanted to post here to start a discussion and see if anyone concurs.
Use cases
The primary two use cases for the clock/calendar/appointments as of now are:
- Checking to see what my next appointment is.
- Quickly checking availability on another day.
- Checking notifications every now and then
Problems
Overflow
My calendars contain both all-day events (birthdays) every day, and anywhere from 4 - 10 events throughout the day. The issue this creates is that it often means the events overflow, obscuring world clocks and weather. It also means scrolling to find what is the next appointment.
Upcoming events at a glance
Another issue I run into is that on particularly busy days in the afternoon is that because the list always shows from the first event of the day to the last, I have to scroll down to find the next upcoming event, as it is hidden further down the list of events. Occasionally I also mix up the times as event titles and times are not clearly grouped.
Missing notifications
Another issue I run into is that I regularly miss notifications, Usually, I’ll be doing a task then notice the small dot next top the clock, click, and realise I missed a notification an hour ago.
Proposed Solutions
Condense all day events
All day events could be displayed on a carousel that displays a single event and rotates at short, regular intervals. Clicking on the carousel would expand the list so you can immediately see all all-day events.
Scroll to current time on event list
Rather than having an event list that can expand to fill all available space, we could limit its size, and make it scrollable. When the calendar/notification tray is opened, events could be scrolled to the current time, with the ability to scroll back to see previous events, and forward to see later events (for very busy calendars).
Clearly group events and times
As of now the format used (Title \n Time \n Title \n Time) does not give adequate visual hierarchy. surrounding event title and time with a box, even one that just displays on hover, could make it easier for users to discern which title is associated with which time.
Icons adjacent to time in top bar represent notifications
By replacing the dot in the top bar with icons representing applications with unread notifications (as is the practice in Android and iOS, for example), it makes it easier for users to notice notifications and to know what apps they are from. Counters could also be added. Enabling Do not disturb would hide all icons.
Upcoming appointment in top bar
Adjacent to the time and date, it could be useful to display the user’s next calendar event (provided it takes place on that day, or perhaps within a certain number of hours of the present time).
2 - 5 minutes before the appointment begins it could also pulse to attract the user’s attention so they don’t risk being late for an appointment. This could also be disabled by enabling Do Not Disturb.
A nice additional feature would be a “quick join” feature, whereby the shell detects links to video calls in the event description, and displays a “quick join” button when the user hovers over the upcoming appointment, allowing them to immediately join the video call.
Final thoughts
I hope you like these suggestions. If you deem them interesting, I could probably put together some basic mockups! Let me know!
I’d also love an invite to the design room on matrix! I’m @me:jmaris.me