Bug 503208 - Hotspot icon disappears when Wi-Fi is turned on – suggest showing disabled icon with explanatory tooltip
Summary: Hotspot icon disappears when Wi-Fi is turned on – suggest showing disabled ic...
Status: RESOLVED FIXED
Alias: None
Product: plasmashell
Classification: Plasma
Component: Networks widget (other bugs)
Version First Reported In: master
Platform: Fedora RPMs Linux
: NOR wishlist
Target Milestone: 1.0
Assignee: Plasma Bugs List
URL:
Keywords:
Depends on:
Blocks:
 
Reported: 2025-04-23 07:44 UTC by Sanmay
Modified: 2025-05-24 07:43 UTC (History)
3 users (show)

See Also:
Latest Commit:
Version Fixed In: 6.5.0
Sentry Crash Report:


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Description Sanmay 2025-04-23 07:44:05 UTC
Description:
Currently, when Wi-Fi is enabled (which is the default behavior), the icon/button for setting up a Wi-Fi hotspot disappears entirely from the Network widget. This kind of makes it unintuitive and difficult to discover how to create a hotspot, in my opinion. I had to search for quite some time before learning that I need to turn off Wi-Fi to even see the hotspot option.

Suggestion:
Instead of hiding the hotspot icon when Wi-Fi is enabled, I suggest that:
  - The hotspot icon should always be visible in the Network widget.
  - When Wi-Fi is on, the hotspot icon should appear disabled (e.g., greyed out).
  - Hovering over the disabled icon should show a tooltip like:
      “Disable Wi-Fi to enable hotspot”
  - Once Wi-Fi is turned off, the icon should become active and allow hotspot setup.

This small change might greatly improve discoverability and user experience, especially for new users or those unfamiliar with the current behavior.

Steps to reproduce:
  - Open the Network widget when Wi-Fi is enabled.
  - Note that the option to start a Wi-Fi hotspot is missing.
  - Disable Wi-Fi – now the hotspot option appears.

Expected behavior:
The hotspot icon should always be visible, even if disabled when Wi-Fi is on, with guidance provided to the user.

System Info:
Fedora KDE 41 Live USB (likely there in latest release - haven't tested)

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
https://invent.kde.org/groups/teams/vdg/issues#95
https://invent.kde.org/groups/teams/vdg/-/issues/?sort=created_date&state=closed&first_page_size=20&show=eyJpaWQiOiI5NSIsImZ1bGxfcGF0aCI6InRlYW1zL3ZkZy9pc3N1ZXMiLCJpZCI6NDgxMzV9

My first bug report here. Please feel free to correct me if anything is not withing the KDE policies.
Comment 1 Nate Graham 2025-04-23 07:54:05 UTC
Right, that's better.
Comment 2 TraceyC 2025-04-23 17:08:00 UTC
Seems reasonble
Comment 3 Bug Janitor Service 2025-04-23 21:53:58 UTC
A possibly relevant merge request was started @ https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-nm/-/merge_requests/427
Comment 4 Nate Graham 2025-05-21 21:12:00 UTC
Git commit 6241b73e160c7acad671d11a7b68c163d80eb3c7 by Nate Graham.
Committed on 21/05/2025 at 21:08.
Pushed by ngraham into branch 'master'.

Show hotspot button + explanatory tooltip when the feature is unavailable

Disabling with an explanatory tooltip is more user-friendly than hiding,
since then the existence of the feature may never become apparent to
some people, and those who do find it may not figure out how to make it
work.
FIXED-IN: 6.4.0

M  +6    -4    applet/contents/ui/Toolbar.qml

https://invent.kde.org/plasma/plasma-nm/-/commit/6241b73e160c7acad671d11a7b68c163d80eb3c7