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Per @Maxim Z's request, I am making my suggestion from the Gravatar bugs and improvements in chat into a full-blown feature request:

I'm not quite sure why, but I think the chat controls would feel more natural on the right, rather than the left.

My idea, as seen below, would be to move the arrow thing to the right side of each chat "bubble". The controls would appear on mouseover, like now, but we could star or flag right from there (the most common tools) without having to have a second window to do that in. The arrow would let you open the window to access other controls, permalink, etc.

On your own posts, which you can't flag or star, you could change the controls to edit/delete, as those are the most common things to do on your own posts.

And this is what your post would look like:

Of course, if you make this change, then the occasional time stamps would have to be moved.

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  • it would be more natural because you are right-handed. – studiohack Aug 14 '10 at 0:45
  • @studio True, I am right-handed. I just checked chat after seeing the [status-complete] tag, and they added quick-links on the right side of the chat, but left the left menu intact. – Jared Harley Aug 14 '10 at 0:50
  • i'm lefthanded, and have noticed over the years that people tend to prefer things on one side or the other based on their hand preference...just an FYI...i think it is a good idea anyhow :-) – studiohack Aug 14 '10 at 0:57
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    @studio It's something I hadn't thought of until I saw your comment. Now that you've shown me a hidden bias of mine, I think I'll go cry myself to sleep. I never knew I was an anti-lefty! – Jared Harley Aug 14 '10 at 1:00
  • yeah, it is still a good idea because most people are left handed...so yeah. nah, don't cry yourself to sleep, its all good :P – studiohack Aug 14 '10 at 1:13
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I like your message mockups a lot. But the timestamps are a problem. They should not take up a single pixel of extra vertical space if possible (and why the line?). Timestamps have to do two things at once:

  • give you an overview of the pace of the conversation (hence shouldn't appear too unfrequently)
  • not be in-your-face if you don't need them; in particular, they should add as little visual noise as possible

That being said, we'll look at it. I have a few thoughts on that, and I'm pretty sure our designer will as well.

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