Re: [User Context] GeoLoc missing API for user justification in prompts

On May 29, 2014, at 4:53 PM, timeless <timeless@gmail.com> wrote:

> James wrote:
>> Giri dropped off the call before this topic came up this morning,
>> but the GeoLocation API is missing a way for web apps to explain
>> to the user *why* they need access to the user's location.
>> It's not always obvious why a blog, news, or conference site wants
>> to use my location. I deny these immediately,
>> even though I may have allowed some had I known the intended use. 
>> 
>> Personally, there's an entire web platform of APIs for this. You can have a 100% opaque div on top of your screen which explains what you want. Just show the explanation before you ask. 

I've never seen a site do this. Perhaps you have an example?

Even so, disparate UI treatments are more confusing to users that commonly formatted UI controls. The purpose of this would be to augment the current API, which currently gives *no* explanation of why it's needed. The justification string would be optional, so lack of it would still result in the same unexplained prompt. Presumably any implementation would still make it clear this prompt was allowing location data, and could even hide the justification string behind a disclosure by default, making it less likely to be abused.

> Any time anyone has ever gotten the ability to have browser-trusted-chrome display a message, they've used it to trick the user.

Misuse of an API does not invalidate valid uses of an API. JavaScript's alert()/confirm()/prompt() methods are reasonably well protected. This could be to.

> Meta tags don't work because they don't handle localization/ translations well. 

Sure they do. You can localize the meta content the same way you localize the visible content.

> Note to self: send comments on Indie UI

Please do.

Received on Friday, 30 May 2014 00:10:55 UTC