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Don Gentner, June 2000
Introduction
The first edition of the Java Look and Feel Design
Guidelines does not contain an explicit standard for the
text that should go in the title bars of primary and
secondary windows. However, the figures in the book
consistently display titles with the format
“ApplicationName: Window Topic”. After giving the
issues some more thought, we are establishing a standard,
and it differs from the format used for the illustrations in
the first edition of the Guidelines. This HI Note describes
the new standard for window titles, which is “Window
Topic - ApplicationName”.
Problems With “ApplicationName: Window
Topic”
The Java Look and Feel Standards in the first edition of
the Design Guidelines do not explicitly specify what text
should appear in window title bars. However, throughout the
book, the titles of primary and secondary windows use the
form “ApplicationName: Window Topic”. For example,
window titles in the book are similar to the title shown in
Figure 1, where “MetalEdit” is the name of the
application and “Engineering Models” is the
document title.
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Figure 1. This is not good
design practice. Minimizing the window can cause
truncation of the title. When the application name
is the first part of a window title, truncation
will often cut off the most important part of the
title.
Note: DO NOT FOLLOW THIS
EXAMPLE.
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Although a window title of the format
“ApplicationName: Window Topic” seems a reasonable
choice, it presents a serious problem. If the window is
minimized in Windows or CDE Motif, the right end of the
window title will often be truncated and it could be
difficult for the user to distinguish between several
documents opened in the same application, for example in the
Microsoft Windows Taskbar shown in Figure 2. You may be
familiar with this problem on Microsoft Windows if you have
ever minimized several documents in an MDI application, such
as Microsoft Word, where each of the minimized documents is
titled “Microso...”.
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Figure 2. A Windows Taskbar.
Note how the window titles have been truncated. It
is no longer possible to distinguish the various
Metal Edit documents.
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The New Standard
Because of this problem with truncated titles in
minimized windows, a new Java Look and Feel standard has
been established. The title should begin with a name that is
descriptive of the window contents, followed by a dash,
followed by the application name. An example is shown in
Figure 3.
 The title text in a primary window should use
the format: Document or Object Name - Application Name
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Figure 3. This illustration
shows the proper format for the window title, with
the document title appearing first. If the title is
truncated, the most important part of the title
remains visible.
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The title text in a secondary window or utility window
should consist of a descriptive window name, optionally
followed by the application name. Include the application
name when users might be unclear which application is
associated with the window.The Reminder dialog box in Figure
4 will often be posted by the MetalButler calendar program
while users is focused on some other task. Therefore, its
window title includes the application name, so users can
identify the application that posted the dialog box.
The title text in a secondary window should use
the format: Descriptive Name - Application Name.
The Application Name is optional and should be included when
the user might not otherwise recognize the source of the
secondary window.
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Figure 4. The window title of a
dialog box should begin with a descriptive
name.
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The alert box shown in Figure 5 would be posted
immediately after the user tried to save a file with an
existing name, and the source of the alert box is clear.
Therefore, the window title does not include the application
name.
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Figure 5. The title of this
alert box does not include the application name
because the source of the dialog will be
obvious.
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