My road to Windows 10: Notification area - are you kidding me?

Friday, July 15, 2016 at 8:43 AM UTC

One new feature of Windows 10 is the notification area which is similar to the one on Linux desktops, iOS or OSX. This is a nice thing in general, especially if there is an API for developers to create their own stuff for it. Asubset of settings is also accessible through the notification area if you expand it.
The tray icon shows you if there were new notifications. But there are some caveats and issues:

  • What defines, what a "new" notification is? Is it just because all infos since the last opening of the area itself or do you have to click on an entry to remove it from the "new" list?
  • Do I have to remove the item(s) if I want to "reset" the notification icon so the state "no new messages"?
  • Even worse: sometimes the icon indicates that there are "new" informations available - but actually there aren't any entries. Bummer.
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Picture: though the icon tells me that there is something "new" I assure you that there wasn't anything to see...

You see, again inconsistency and more questions than answers. A nice idea was realized with obviously no clue of how it should work for the user.

Severity: inconsistent, inaccurate







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