Add a "launching" indicator, like AWN dock has it

If you have any ideas on how this could be implemented, please inform me. /Matias

-I don't know what effects are possible for panel icons. But I guess, some kind of rotating, flipping or changing colors of the icons should be possible, because this is already working - think of the minimal style (color, half-color, grey). You could also overlay a gif animation. A click on a launcher always starts the animation. As soon as the app has launcher, the "win7 rectangle overlay image" is shown. So it's already possible to detect, when apps are launched. Use this to stop the animation/overlay of the loading indicator.

Matias: A tad off topic, but Win7 has a really cool launching animation. Essentially, a colored glow erupts behind the icon, then fades away.

When the app is done loading, a colored border pulses just inside the button.

Matias: Thanks for the suggestions, what I really meant with suggestions for implementation was how dockbarx is supposed to know when to end the effect, though. It's easy enough if the program is loaded successfully, that's when the window with the right ref.class is opened. But how is dockbar supposed to know if a launch is unsuccessful? Should the launcher effect stop automatically after a few seconds? Would that look weird on some slow starting programs like OO.o?

Alex: AWN seems to have some sort of mechanism for cutting off the animation for quick launches. OO Writer takes a long time to launch, and the launching animation actually finishes before it's done.

I think a quick, simple effect would be best. Perhaps a mousedown event could be used instead, or as a supplement. Applications almost never fail to launch, so I don't see a problem with using the animation all the time. And, but making it consistent, there would be no problem with long or short applications.

If you can figure out a way to determine how long a launch takes, that would be ideal. but I don't think it is necessary.

Matias: Ok, I've added the a launcher effect. It's static. No animations. The themeing engine isn't really suited for animations. The launcher effect will be shown for five seconds after clicked (should that be longer?) or until a window is opened. The effect is added to a theme with <if type="launching"></if>. Tell me what you think.