Created attachment 108475 [details] paper-mockup jpg I created a mock (see attached) up with some ideas. Please feel free to steal as much as you like. 1: The 'name' is obviously the name of the vault, but when hovering over it you see it is clickable. Clicking it will open the directory in dolphin. 2: when hovering anywhere on the encrypted vault or files (see 4), show the config icon (see klipper how this works). The config icon opens a new window with the configuration. 3: much like now; mount and unmount icons. For mount also see 6. 4: for the vault, show recently opened documents. Clicking on them will open the associated application with this doc in it. Bonus points for making this activity sensitive. Which means that if I opened a doc in Activity1, it doesn't show up here when in Activity2. 5: Create new vault. Much like the "add activity" button in plasma, only looks like a button on mouse-hover. Opens the wizard. 6: A second, not mounted, vault. The configure and mount icon only show on hover. Where on a mounted vault the clicking on the name (see 1) caused dolphin to be opened, here it slides out an input field for the password and an Ok button to attempt mounting it. Assuming the vault plasma widget is on a panel, we want to make the interaction be smooth for the people where this opens the popup. The goal is to mount and open a recent file in one go. This way you can also give better feedback and avoid interrupting the workflow. Hope you like it!
Before I start - the Vault applet is made to look as much as the device applet since they do similar things. While I mostly like the proposed ideas, I'm afraid that most of them go into 1) overly problematic to implement properly (I'm trying to keep things as simple as possible because we had great ideas some years ago, but most of the ideas required holes in security :) or 2) It would be really cool to have, but I'm unsure a simple applet is the right place for it. Commenting in a changed order: > 5: Create new vault Yes, the button can be made flat as in the activity switcher > 4: for the vault, show recently opened documents. This is a cool idea, but I'm afraid it is out of the scope of the applet (and would be really problematic implementation-wise). The 'recent documents' meta-data is one of the privacy concerns I have with Vaults. While the contents of a file is encrypted, the "Hey, you opened the file named 'how-to-make-your-secret-lair.txt' in Kate" is not - and that can be problematic. :) > 2: when hovering anywhere on the encrypted vault or files (see 4) I don't think that "configure" is an action that should be invoked often -- therefore, I do not see the reason to show it next to the mount/umount. > 1: The 'name' is obviously the name of the vault, but when > hovering over it you see it is clickable. Clicking it will open the directory in dolphin. This I would be fine with, if that was how the Device notifier would behave. One thing where the Device notifier UI beats Vault is that it automatically expands the actions for the last inserted device. I'm not sure what that would mean for vaults. > 6: opened, here it slides out an input field for the password and an Ok button to attempt mounting it. This is something I'm investigating. If I manage to do it in a secure way (without Plasma sending the password to the Vault daemon via dbus or other channel that can be spied on), this will be implemented.
> I don't think that "configure" is an action that should be invoked often -- therefore, I do not see the reason to show it next to the mount/umount. I considered this and suggest to make the icon only visible when you over over it. Like Klipper hides most buttons. I mean, you need to put this somewhere, and with the design I mocked up you only need 1 line per mount (and extra lines only if recent files are added). This is rather useful as it avoids an extra click and avoids stuff moving around (collapsing / expanding when clicked. > One thing where the Device notifier UI beats Vault is that it automatically expands the actions for the last inserted device I see, you emulated the device notifier. I'm pretty sure that the added features for inserting a phone or a camera launching specialistic software that speaks that protocol are not useful for vault. Its obviously never going to be anything but a storage of files. Copying concepts from plasmoids like klipper, bluetooth, network-manager and others makes it still consistent as far as I can tell. I think the one-line solution from the mockup will be more user-friendly and more consistent in the KDE plasma desktop as a whole. Thanks for your consideration :)
> I considered this and suggest to make the icon only visible when you over > over it. Like Klipper hides most buttons. There is a big issue with how Klipper does things - it can not be used with touch screens properly - items get shown on hover which you don't have on touch.