Blue Onion Software

What’s new:

• Performance: The gadget purges older tweets from memory. This should help greatly with overall performance.
• More Links: Like the web site, when you get to the end of the tweet list, there’s a “- more –” link that gets the next 20 tweets.

I’m zeroing in on the 2.0 release. The more link on the search panel is not working just yet. Also working on rounded corners for the background (no I didn’t forget).

Available on the downloads page.

Working great! (As did Beta 1-4) Have to admit, I miss the new-tweet notification ("12 new tweets") behavior, but it's plenty good as it is now.

Beta4 had a problem with native retweets getting cut off (Tweetz added "RT ", but didn't allow for a 143 character display, so the last 3-ish characters were cutoff). Haven't tested that in Beta5 yet.

This is so much nicer than 1.x. Great work!

I liked the notification bar better myself as well. If there are not too many objections, I think I'll put it back in.

I love this gadget! Any thoughts on using an image for the background? I am using a custom theme for my win7 and it would be sweet to be able to match this gadget with the theme. Thanks for the great gadget!

Hi Mike,

I just recently discovered this gadget and so far I am loving it! Thank you so much for developing this and continuing to improve it. It's quickly moving up my list of favorite Twitter applications and may just get the crown soon! Keep up the great work!

I wanted to offer a few suggestions, and I hope this is the right forum for doing so.

For reference, here are the relevant options I've selected within my install of tweetz 2.0.0.0 Beta 5:
I'm using the larger size.
I am using the brighter font.
I am using the medium font size.
I have increased the expanded height to 750.

My suggestions:
1. Include a way for users to be notified of updates. This functionality may already be in the program as I was previously using 1.5.0.0 and the more recent releases have been betas. I'm currently following your RSS feed, so it isn't necessary for me, but for "regular" users it may be helpful.

2. I know you mentioned that you wanted to keep the options simplified, so perhaps the Options/Configuration screen can be separated into two tabs: basic and advanced. This could allow you to add additional options without it being overcomplicated for new/less-savy users.

3. An option to change how certain tweets are displayed. Naturally, mentions (and direct messages--see suggestion 9 below) usually are more important (for lack of a better word) and being able to see them right away is helpful. If you were to "mirror" these tweets so that the sender's avatar is on the right side and the text is on the left, it would be visually different and easy to notice. Perhaps you could see if changing the background color (such as a lighter gray color) could work as well/instead. This might also be helpful for tweets that the user sends (my tweets).

4. The optional feature that I'm probably most anxious to see is this one: that tweets coming into the program get marked as "unread". If you were to provide an icon within each tweet showing that it was "unread" it would allow the user to know that they have not yet "dismissed" this tweet (marked it as "read").

Here's my case scenario for this feature: I often receive a possibly high volume of tweets on any given day, maybe 50 to 100. If I am away from the computer for an extended period, I can quickly get "behind" on reading my feed of new tweets. This is especially true if I'm away for a weekend. When I return to my computer, if I am able to scroll down the list to the last "read" tweet, I could then start working my way back up the list. By having a small icon notifying me of a tweet's status, I could easy navigate to the appropriate place. Additionally, when I am just simply working on my computer, I could quickly glance over to tweetz and see if I have any "unread" tweets. This would be MUCH faster than reading the top-most tweet and determining whether I have already seen that tweet. There are a few places where you could logically place such an icon.

Then, by having the user click somewhere inside the tweet, the tweet could be marked as "read".

An alternative to using an icon to show the read/unread status is to use a different background color (a different shade of gray) or to put a blue box outline around the avatar, the tweet text, or both (using the same blue color that is used on users' names.)

If you do implement this feature, it would also be helpful to have a "Mark All As Read" button. That way if I am trying to go through a long list to catch up, I can just read them with my mouse's scroll wheel (without clicking them as "read") and click once on the "mark all as read button" to finish the job.

For what it's worth, this feature would provide similar functionality to how twhirl (a Twitter program built on Adobe Air) works.

5. In the "type a new message screen", there is an icon with the hover text that says "ctrl + K". I've experimented with it briefly, but was unable to fully understand what it does. Can you please offer an explanation (and perhaps provide more explanatory hover text)?

6. Please provide an option for URLs within tweets to appear as full links. I know that I can hover over the "[link]" text and see the URL, but here's why it would be helpful to see the full URL: the sidebar gadget must be the focused object to have hover text work for the link. This means that I can't hover over the link and type the URL into another window (such as my web browser) simultaneously. As soon as I focus on my web browser, the hover text within tweetz disappears.

The reasoning is this: I don't normally like to just "blind-follow" URL-shortened links, but with bit.ly (for example), I can add "+" to the end to get info about the link from bit.ly instead of being autoforwarded. (Example: I setup http://bit.ly/clUWQu to go to Blue Onion Software's blog. If you add a "+" to the end and go to http://bit.ly/clUWQu+ you will see a bit.ly page showing info about the link first.) If I could see the full link, I would be able to type the bit.ly link into my browser and add the "+" to the end.

7. The top bar within tweetz functions differently than expected. The common UI experience is that the top bar of any Windows program is largely a "safe zone" (meaning, that I could click the top bar to focus on that window). With tweetz, it toggles the new message box on and off. I believe that it should instead just allow tweetz to be the focused window.

Additionally, the "t" icon seems to function the same way as the top bar, and I believe that users would expect that button to link them directly to Twitter within their web browser.

I readily see four "easy" options for the new message box instead:
a. Have an icon on the top bar that you can click for a new message.
b. Have an area above or below the bottom icons (Home, @, DMs, etc.) that always displays a new message box.
c. Change the bottom right icon from being "About Me" to "Write". Clicking on the new "Write" icon would bring up the new message box.
d. ADD a new icon to the bottom icons that would be a "Write" icon. Clicking on the new "Write" icon would bring up the new message box.

8. Speaking of the icon on the bottom (Home, Replies, Direct Messages, Favorites, Search, About Me), could you provide hover text for these items?

9. An option to place Direct Messages within the main feed would be great! I know that there is a blue box outline around the Direct Messages icon when I have new DMs, but it's awkward in usage. When checking on tweetz to quickly see if there is anything new for me to respond to, I now have to check at the top of the program for new (normal) tweets AND down at the bottom for new DMs. Being able to look at one place would be MUCH easier.

If DMs do make it in to the main feed, can they be indicated as such so that they stand out better (see suggestion 3, above)?

10. Lastly, when I click on the reply button to a Direct Message, it defaults to a Reply/Mention (@originalSender). It would be helpful if replying to a DM would instead cause me to reply with a DM instead of a Mention. This pertains to the Direct Message section right now, but if DMs can be placed within the main feed, it should be there too.

Well, this has been MUCH longer than I expected. I've just been very satisfied with how tweetz worked and wanted to offer some suggestions to improve it. I jotted down about 5 or 6 "quick" ideas and in trying to communicate them, it's turned into much more. I hope that the length has made things MORE clear by my explanations. In reality, I hope that this message helps to improve tweetz. Thanks again!!

Jeff,

I appreciate you taking the time respond with a detailed message.

1. By updates I assume you mean new releases of tweetz. This is a pet peeve of mine but I hate programs that do this. I could add a link in the settings dialog to check for new updates manually. Would this be sufficient?

2. The new tweet indication is a work in progress. Currently, the divider line of the last new tweet is brighter. The problem of "new tweets status indicators" is that you have to un-mark them at some point. I keep casting about for a solution that doesn't require this. Your suggestion is not out of the question but I keep thinking there is a less obtrusive way to do this.

3. I've been thinking about "mirroring" user tweets like some of the other programs out there. Perhaps the next version.

4. See item 2

5. It's a link shortener. If you tweet contains a link, it get's shortened. I'll add some text to the pop up.

6. I'll add an option to show full links

7. Gadget title bars don't have a predefined behavior per se although I see your point. I did this because it's a nice fat target to hit. A bit odd but I think it makes the gadget easier to use.

8. Again, I find these bubble messages annoying personally. It takes just a few seconds of fiddling with the gadget to figure out what they do. Unless I get a lot of feedback to this I'll likely not do it.

9. I've wanted a "consolidated" view myself. Interestingly, your the first to suggest it. Something for the next version perhaps.

10. I'm not sure I understand this. The behavior of hitting reply on a DM should be a DM. There should be no message adornments. I'll double check this when I get home. Send me a screen shot so I can better understand the issue.

Again, thanks for the great feedback.

- Mike

Hi Mike,

What a fast response!

1. Yes, I meant that it would be helpful to know when new versions of tweetz is released. Just a friendly suggestion (and I'm not saying that it should auto-update or anything). Maybe you could provide an option for being notified and it provides a tweet-like notification within the main feed. Again, I'm now following your RSS feed (of your blog), so I'll be seeing references to updates there... others just might like to know without having to check the website regularly or using an RSS reader.

2/4. Thanks for pointing out the divider line for the last tweet. Honestly, I hadn't noticed that before.

It's great to know that you are looking into this type of functionality and are looking for an elegant way to overcome the obstacles. It really shows within the program that you are deliberately trying to improve the product with elegant design decisions.

For now, I'll continue to use both tweetz and another Twitter program or two until this functionality is released in tweetz. It's "important" that I don't miss any tweets on my feed and some of the others provide this functionality.

7/8. I see your point too! It's entirely your decision of course, but I'll say this: gadgets don't normally HAVE a title bar. But since tweetz does, I believe it should function a little more like a "normal" Windows title bar. I'm just trying to provide some alternative suggestions from a UI perspective. :)

10. Based on my interaction with this, the following happens:
If I'm in the Direct Messages section of tweetz and click on the Reply (chat bubble icon), it gives me a new message box. The top says "To: @[user]". This suggests that I'm sending a Mention/Reply in response and not a Direct Message.

If tweetz is really sending a DM in this case, perhaps the top line can change from saying "To: @[user]" to "Direct message to: [user]". I will email you a screenshot of what I see.

Thanks again for your fast reply and a BIG thanks for your work on tweetz. I'm now REALLY looking forward to the future releases! ;)

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