Projects/Usability/HIG/SOU Workspace/Context Menu

Context Menu

Contextual menus are menus called by user interaction that provide a set of commands related to the context of where the interaction takes place within the interface object. They offer only items that are applicable or relevant to the object or region at the location of the focus or the pointer.

The appearance of contextual menus is similar to that of drop-down menus, including the display of accelerator keys and keyboard shortcuts, but they do not have a menu title.

A contextual menu appears when the user right-clicks an object, or focuses the object and presses Shift+F10.

Guidelines

• Provide a contextual menu for every object, selectable part, and text input target such as entry fields.

• Every item which is displayed in the contextual menu must also be provided in the menu.

• Provide keyboard accelerators for every item in the contextual menu.

• For ease of use, keep contextual menus simple by avoiding more than ten items in a menu, and avoiding submenus.

• Organize items in a contextual menu in the expected frequency-of-use order, considering the guidelines for grouping items. If existent, provide the double-click action for the object on the first position

Example - KDE desktop context menu