Re: [Pan-users] About colors of read and watched messages...

[Gollum]

Maurizio Colucci wrote:
> For a watched message M the color is always the watched color,
> unregardless of whether M has been read or not.
> This is a conceptual flaw! The read-unread state is a more important
> concept than watched-unwatched, so it should be marked in the most
> apparent way: the color. The less important concept (watched or not)
> should be marked by an icon.

I'm also missing a more visible way to discern between read and unread
articles within watched threads, but I think the watched/unwatched state
is about equally important as read/unread.

> [...]
> Using only watched articles, you totally loose the capability to tell
> read messages from unread ones by looking at the color. There is still
> the icon, but it's useless because both read and unread messages have
> it, and it's only slightly different---so this difference does not hit
> the eye.

I agree.  Especially when using small fonts, the top of the open
envelope icon is cropped, making it hard to see the difference.  It
would help if the icons were more different, e.g. green (fresh) when
new, white (clean) if unread but old, and yellow (dirty/used) if read. 
But these icons are replaced when there are attachments, so that's not
really sufficient.

> Instead, I need to tell a read watched message from an unread watched
> message at a glance, by looking at the color.

I think we should do one of the following:
- Use /italics/ or _underlined_ for read articles.  (My first choice.)
- Use an additional colour (default blue?) for watched, read articles.

> In conclusion, I suggest that Pan mark watched messages NOT with a
> color, but with an icon (like Agent does: sunglassess icon), so the
> read-unread state can be marked with a color consistently, both in
> watched and unwatched messages.

I still wold like watched threads to be marked with a separate colour
(or several colours).

> Maybe I should post a bugzilla request?

I think you should; file it as an enhancement.  The main point should
be making the difference between watched unread and watched read more
visible.