feedbackd/Feedback-theme-spec-0.0.0.md

Overview

A feedback theme defines the kind of feedback that events (as described in the Event naming spec) will trigger.

The feedback daemon is responsible to select an appropriate feedback theme for a given device.

Definitions

• Feedback: A feedback is something that notifies the user that s.th. happened (e.g. a played sound, the vibration of a haptic motor or led blinking).

• Feedback theme: A feedback theme is a set of feedbacks grouped by profiles. Each feedback is mapped to a single event.

• Feedback Profile: A feedback profile groups feedbacks by "noisiness". The currently defined profiles names are full, quiet and silent. With full being the noisiest profile.

• Event: What the user should be notified about. The event names are built according to the Event naming spec.

Implementation

When an application triggers feedback for an event in the feedback daemon the daemon selects the provided feedback like this:

1. feedbacks from a nosier profiles like the currently selected are ignored

2. All other feedbacks for this event are selected and run to provide feedback to the user

With the above a feedback theme in YAML format could look like:

full:
    - event-name: phone-incoming-call
      type: Sound
      effect: phone-incoing-call
    - event-name: message-new-sms
    ...
quiet:
    - event-name: phone-incoming-call
      type: Vibra
      duration: 0.5s
    - event-name: message-new-sms
    ...
silent:
    - event-name: phone-incoming-call
      type: Led
      location: Front
      Color: Green
      Interval: 0.2s
    - event-name: message-new-sms
    ...

At the time of writing the theme format is daemon dependent. E.g. feedbackd uses a format similar to the above in JSON.

Recommendations

• The silent theme shoud not produce any audible feedback. This includes the buzzing of haptic motors.
• The quiet theme should not play any sounds. Haptic motors and LEDs can be used.
• The full feedback theme can use any available feedback mechanisms