So, we were discussing the message window on IRC tonight, and in the course of talking through a few design issues, I remembered an ooold idea that we never did that actually doesn't seem that hard to implement: Make the message text field float (in a fixed position) over the message view, with a css tweak to bump the message content up so it's not obscured. I made a few mockups by hacking up the html from smooth op 2's topic field. Obviously not shippable at this point, but looks pretty neat nonetheless (sample content is not intended to make sense, bits got cut out, etc…).
http://dscoder.com/images/tabsmockup.png http://dscoder.com/images/notabsmockup.png Colin suggests that the scrollbar shouldn't be all the way at the bottom like I have it, based on his iOS experience; I just didn't feel like fixing it in Photoshop. Various other extensions of the concept are possible (like the "hide, but show for use" combo you can get in Safari with hide address bar + cmd-L). The cool part about this (aside from just being shiny) is that it very clearly associates the message entry field with the message view, without needing to wrap things in borders. David
