45097 - Provide cursor feedback for functions [ability to change cursor]

Status: RESOLVED WORKSFORME

(SeaMonkey :: General, defect, P3)

Description

[Blake Ross]

We currently provide no real cursor feedback to the user that something is 
happening when something takes > 1 second.  We should be providing the user's 
default "wait" cursor (i.e., usually an hourglass on win or a ticking watch on 
mac) when starting a function, even if the function presumably shouldn't take a 
long time (what's fast on your PIII gigahertz isn't on Bob's ol' 486)

cc'ing some random people for ideas on doing this

Comment 1

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

Is this something that is spec'd already?

Comment 2

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

adding BenGoodger, -a UI issue?

Comment 3

[saari (gone)]

I know I've filed bugs on this before. It is just curtious and the least you can 
do when your app is slow...

Comment 4

[Blake Ross]

Just to clarify, I guess this really isn't a bug to change the cursor any time 
something could take long, but rather, a bug for the _ability_ to do so (I've 
heard that there's problems setting the cursor, because it changes back, etc).  
Then, I assume, separate bugs would have to be filed in all the different areas 
where the cursor needs to be set.

And I completely agree with Chris; not only is this behavior courteous to 
users, but it's what they expect of an app.

cc andrew because, iirc, we were talking about this on IRC a while back

Comment 5

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

this looks like xp more than ui, I say we have a running lizard for busy ;)

Comment 6

[andreww]

Thanks for the CC blake. I wonder if in leu of a cursor change that perhaps in 
the status bar having an hourglass or something which the user could see...  But 
I agree that it's not a hard-coded hourglass we're looking for but just the 
ability to change the cursor at any time.

I'm betting this is a dupe, though.

Comment 7

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

I can't find a dupe anywhere.  Who should get this bug?  Is this a toolkit issue?

Comment 8

[Blake Ross]

Don't know...saari, any idea?

Comment 9

[andreww]

I was thinking this was a dupe of the following bug:
http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1916

Since being able to change the cursor via the style mechanism seems to be the
best way to implement this... just my guess.

Comment 10

[Blake Ross]

Thanks, Andrew.  As that has become a meta bug, I'm going to leave this open 
and make it dependent on that.  If that ever gets fixed (not likely any time 
soon...it's future), perhaps we can then make this a meta bug for all the cases 
where we should show the "waiting" (e.g. hourglass on windows) cursor.

Comment 11

[Pierre Saslawsky]

'cursor:wait' is supported by all 3 platforms. This bug shouldn't have been 
marked as depending on bug 1916. The chrome should change the cursor before 
starting an operation that's going to take a long time.

Comment 12

[Blake Ross]

In that case...Andrew, Saari, anyone else on the CC list: can you foresee any 
other problems blocking the implementation of this?  Once the cursor is 
changed, will it remain the new cursor?

Comment 13

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

someone want to own this?

Comment 14

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

We're doing this now correct?  At least on win32 and Mac I see the cursor turn
into the wait state cursor...  Can we call this Fixed or Worksforme?

Comment 15

[saari (gone)]

Yeah kills this bug. If there are places where we're not setting the cursor and
should be those can be individual bugs

Comment 16

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

resolving this WFM. 082409 win32 and Mac builds.

Comment 17

[Doron Rosenberg (IBM)]

**Mass Spamm**
adding verifyme keyword to all worksforme bugs.