Re: Defining safe areas for media devices and set top boxes

On Dec 7, 2010, at 9:23 , Joćo Eiras wrote:
>>> Not enough at all. Content (significant or not) can very well reach the edges of screen, as in any other user agent.
>> 
>> So, to be clear, you want to be able to paint anything, not just background, in the unsafe area?  Why, if it's unsafe?
>> 
> 
> Because a background image is not enough, because web app UIs are dynamic and content can shift around, say, when drag and dropping, because something as simple as a header and a footer can very well snap to the edges, because if there is more than one page of text, it overflows the viewport downwards, and so on. Not hard to imagine why,
> 
> The unsafe area is not a no mans land, just a area of the viewport which *might* not be rendered, so by default, the main content should avoid it.

So if the main (foreground) content should avoid it, why not define that the foreground area is the safe area, and the background paints into the unsafe area?

Overflowing the viewport downwards into the unsafe area means it may not be readable.  E.g. the UA displays text lines 1-30, but only 1-27 are readable.  The user does page-down, and the UA shows lines 31-60.  The user never read 28-30, which is bad.

It doesn't help the user if he can drag things around in an area where he can't see what he's doing, either.  A footer that snaps off-screen into the bottom of the unsafe area and becomes invisible doesn't seem very helpful.

So I am having a hard time understanding what you're wanting, so far.

David Singer
Multimedia and Software Standards, Apple Inc.

Received on Tuesday, 7 December 2010 15:29:59 UTC