[JDEV] Emoticons: guidelines

Sat Apr 20 21:56:52 CDT 2002

As you all saw, my initial proposal was purely receiver-based (i.e.,
the receiving program converted anything "interesting"-looking into
an icon), but it looks to me like you're all trying to figure out some
standard way of integrating non-text elements into messages :-(

In that case, my proposal is simple - use an embedded element:
<message to="dave at dave.tj">This is a <x xmlns="html"><img src="http://dave.tj:8080/icons/envelope.png" alt="message"/></x> containing <x xmlns="html"><img src="http://dave.tj:8080/icons/2emoticons.png" alt="two emoticons"/></x>.</message>

Any new client (text-only or non-text-only) will be able to support
this quite easily, and any existing client won't be too difficult to
modify to accomodate this convention.  In other words, it has all the
advantages of HTML ... because ... ahem ... it ... well ... _is_ HTML ;-)

Dave Cohen <dave at dave.tj>

Motto: Never invent anything you don't have to :-)

Mattias Campe wrote:
> 
>  > ----- Original Message ----- From: "Mattias Campe"
>  > <mattias.campe at rug.ac.be> To: <jdev at jabber.org> Sent: Thursday,
>  > April 18, 2002 6:44 PM Subject: Re: [JDEV] Emoticons: guidelines
>  >
>  >
>  >
>  >> Richard Dobson wrote:
>  >>
>  >>> Well what about creating a new x element for message which
>  >>> allows people
>  >>
>  > to
>  >
>  >>> define emoticon text replacements e.g.
>  >>>
>  >>> <message type="chat" to="medds at me.com" from="friend at friend.com">
>  >>> <body>This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D</body> <x
>  >>> xmlns="jabber:x:emoticon"> <emoticon text="(L)" icon="love"/> <emoticon
>  >>> text=":)" icon="smile"/> <emoticon text=";)" icon="wink"/> <emoticon
>  >>> text=":D" icon="grin"/> </x> </message>
>  >>>
>  >> [...]
>  >>
>  >> I'm not sure if I understand it, but doesn't this mean that the
>  >> client has to support this x element? So if the client doesn't
>  >> want to support that element, people using that client will get
>  >> "This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D" I'll
>  >> understand the ":) (L) ;) :D" part, but what about (L)?
>  >>
>  >> And won't this cause to much overhead? In the example you gave me
>  >> the body itself contains less characters than the x-element.
>  >>
>  >> Just my thoughts...
>  >>
>  >> ..m.
>  >>
> [...]
> Richard Dobson wrote:
>  > Yes it does mean that the client has to support this x element, it
>  > means that it works fine with clients that dont support it, this
>  > method also allows the message sender complete control of where and
>  > when the emoticons are displayed, so the message will be displayed as
>  > the sender intended, and not as happens in msn messenger certain
>  > strings getting replaced when you didnt want them to, and not relying 
>  > on the recipient client to determine if
>  > a particular string should be changed into an emoticon or not. Also
>  > as jabber users will not all be using a single particular client it
>  > allows better cross-client compatibility. Also the problem of it
>  > creating lots of overhead, well the syntax of the x element could be
>  > cut down, I did it long and readable so it was easier to understand
>  > for people here when reading my example.
>  >
>  > My 2p
>  >
>  > Richard
> 
> I thought about it a bit (hmm, actually a lot ;) ) and I started to like 
> the idea. So to reduce the overhead the message could be sth. like:
> 
> <message type="chat" to="medds at me.com" from="friend at friend.com">
> 	<body>This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D</body> 	
> 	<x xmlns="jabber:x:econ">
> 		<econ text="(L)" icon="luv"/>
> 		<econ text=":)" icon="smile"/>
> 		<econ text=";)" icon="wink"/>
> 		<econ text=":D" icon="grin"/>
> 	</x>
> </message>
> 
> I should even make it shorter by omitting the smileys from the x element 
> because they explain themselves. In this example the overhead would be 
> reduced to 3/4!! So the example would be:
> 
> <message type="chat" to="medds at me.com" from="friend at friend.com">
> 	<body>This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D</body> 	
> 	<x xmlns="jabber:x:econ">
> 		<econ text="(L)" icon="luv"/>
> 	</x>
> </message>
> 
> I use a smiley maybe at least every 5th message so that would reduce 
> overhead a lot!
> 
> 
> Now, why my sudden change to like the x-element thought too (too = like 
> the colon method):
> 
> pros:
> ~~~~~
> 
> + _internationalisation_ : I think a lot of people here on 
> jdev at jabber.org have English as their native language. So "I :love: you" 
> sounds very familiar, still, for sb. like me (speaking Dutch) it would 
> be "Ik :love: van jou" or French "Je t' :love:" or German "Ich :love: 
> dich" it looks a little bit silly doesn't it? E.g. French people are 
> very keen on their own language (e.g. they use "un ordinateur" for "a 
> computer").
> 
> + _scalability_ : if the colon method would be used we are stuck too 
> whatever is decided to be standard. Suppose we all agree to use :luv: to 
> show a heart as graphic. So, it becomes a standard, but after a few 
> weeks people start complaining about not getting it, WTF is :luv: ? 
> "Euhm, it means :love:, sorry folks, but we can't change it :("
> 
> + ... (plz add if you see some more)
> 
> 
> Still I see some problems too, "the cons":
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> 
> - _time_ : It will take time before all clients can support this new 
> x-element. The colon method doesn't need time because it explains itself.
> 
> - _non-supporting-emoticons-clients_ : Will a client developer 
> developing a client that doesn't (want to) support emoticons want to 
> implement the new x-element to translate e.g.
> 
> <message type="chat" to="medds at me.com" from="friend at friend.com">
> 	<body>This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D</body> 	
> 	<x xmlns="jabber:x:econ">
> 		<econ text="(L)" icon="luv"/>
> 	</x>
> </message>
> 
> to: "This is a emoticon containing message :) :love: ;) :D"
> 
> instead of just: "This is a emoticon containing message :) (L) ;) :D" ?
> 
> Because that is the whole point here: making it clear to people who 
> don't (want to) use emoticons...
> 
> - ... (plz add if you see some more)
> 
> ~~~~~~~//end of cons
> 
> 
> Theo, if you like some of the ideas and want to use them to put on 
> http://www.theoretic.com/?Jabber_Client_Guidelines , go ahead!
> 
> 
> To put things a little bit easy,* too easy actually, but anyway: "Give 
> me a good and stable client with working file transfer and I can 
> convince my younger sister (15 years old) in 1-2-3 to switch to Jabber, 
> give me the same + cooler emoticons than MSN and I can do it in 1-2 (and 
> if you can also give me a client that is fully skinnable (winamp3 like) 
> I can do it in 1)..."
> 
> 
> Btw I won't be checking jdev at jabber.org this weekend, just that you know...*
> 
> 
> greetz
> .m.
> 
> _______________________________________________
> jdev mailing list
> jdev at jabber.org
> http://mailman.jabber.org/listinfo/jdev
> 