Rocket.chat.electron: Notification Handling in Windows

[skullchap]

My Setup

• Operating System: Windows 7,10
• App Version: 2.11.0

Description

Not much of and issue but a feature request for handling Notifications

Current Behavior

Notifications (toastNotifications) stays only for 7 seconds. Changing registry (or settings in control panel/accesibility) to 5 min extends them only by 20 seconds

What i would like to have

I used Openfire/Spark before in my environment and Spark had one nifty feature - you would able to toggle Spark Main window to pop up after receiving a DM. With current notifications handling its so easy to miss DM, even icon on tray doesnt pop up and blink. Also i would like to have an option for notification to stay on screen until the message is read. Maybe there is workaround i would like to know about. Thank you.

[Maqsyo]

We used Spark before too, but Rocket.Chat is better in so many points.
But this little blinking icon was really great!
+1 for this request!

[Anguel]

This problem has actually been discussed in so many threads but still no fix. It makes the software unusable for our company... At least the developers should add an option to prevent the main window from being closed, this way the program will stay in taskbar and will not disappear in tray. This should not be so hard to do.

[kaiiiiiiiii]

This should not be so hard to do.

Feel free to submit a PR for that issue mate :)

[engelgabriel]

Can you please try the https://github.com/RocketChat/Rocket.Chat.Electron/releases/tag/2.13.0-develop ? The ICON on the tray now has a badge and the notification system has been updated.

[Anguel]

@engelgabriel Unfortunately, I don't see any improvement if the Rocket.Chat window is closed and sitting in the tray the new message is still missed (Windows 10).

[tassoevan]

Notifications (toastNotifications) stays only for 7 seconds. Changing registry (or settings in control panel/accesibility) to 5 min extends them only by 20 seconds

I can't reproduce this in 2.13.3 under Windows 10.

[crazy-max]

I think we should use the advanced notifications of Electron on the Windows desktop app. This will allow custom templates, images, and other flexible elements. What do you think @tassoevan ?

[tassoevan]

@crazy-max I have considered the electron-windows-notifications library. However, it introduces a new problem solved (with native code) by Electron's Brightray: image handling. Rocket.Chat notifications have a avatar image encoded as a data URI, unsupported by Windows notifications. Brightray (and I believe Chrome too) handles that by storing the avatar as a temporary file, generating a shorter URI to the notification payload. Also, this library don't try to use the same web-based Notifications API. To develop something good will take some effort...

[crazy-max]

@tassoevan Okay, thanks for your clarifications!

[Bellamonte]

Neither notifications nor unread messages badge on tray icon works for me.

OS: Windows 7
Rocket.Chat version: 2.14.1

[Anguel]

@Bellamonte Did you try the new menu option:
https://github.com/RocketChat/Rocket.Chat.Electron/pull/895#issuecomment-433838248
At least it works on Windows 10.

[Bellamonte]

@Bellamonte Did you try the new menu option:
#895 (comment)
At least it works on Windows 10.
Ah, didn't see that. I just checked it. Will see tomorrow, if it works.

[tassoevan]

I did some experiments with electron-windows-notifications and electron-windows-interactive-notifications and other libraries for notifications in Node.js today and it was disappointing. Besides have to hack Electron even more (electron-builder is enough headache), there is no reliable way to keep the notifications in Action Center and track actions over them at the same time. The needed amount of work is way bigger than I was expecting or there is a totally different way to handle toast notifications in Windows that I not aware of.

[Anguel]

@tassoevan Tasso, just an idea: If the Windows notifications disappear to fast, how about adding a simple feature to resend a reminder notification every X minutes if there are still unread messages? Something like "You still have 3 unread messages". Just an idea. Would that help?