Clicking the background color icon opens a palette of colors. But clicking the A (font color icon) does NOTHING. VERY confusing for regular users.
[Reproducible] with "LibreOffice 3.3.1 – WIN7 Home Premium (64bit) German UI [OOO330m19 (build 8 / tag 3.3.1.2)]". The report is a little rare so that I can't be absolutely sure whether I see the same problem like the reporter; My observations are a little different and for a more general problem. Steps to reproduce (for me it's the same in CALC and WRITER) 1. Dock and arrange toolbar so that one of color pickers character / background still is visible, but the other one will only appear if you click the "show more "field (so that the hidden function will appear together with customize item). You also can reach that resizing the complete window. 2. click "show more" area 3. Click color button expected: color picker will appear actual: nothing (or may be latest used color will be taken, but no picker will appear) 4. to compare, try visible Icon, it will work 11. for an other comparison you can interchange order of icons so that an other one will be visible (using "customize ...), you will see, always only the visible one will bring up the color picker. I thought that we should have already a bug report for that, but I can't find any. It's the same with OOo 3.4-dev @reporter: I also think that it is the same problem for all OS, but please contribute information concerning your OS!
Created attachment 43811 [details] See Comment 1
The problem exist with visible buttons for me so the new bug description doesn't fit what I see. Perhaps it's more severe for me because I've removed all other toolbars but Standard and even edited the Standard a little. But all icon are visible - including the one that doesn't work - font color picker.
@filkin: Most important: In you comments you should please always answer to all questions. What's your OS? Please attach a screenshot concerning your toolbars similar to mine It's also possible that it has nothing to do with visibility, but with order in the toolbar 8only first works ...), can you please do such additional checks? Can yo confirm my results concerning WRITER / DRAW? Even if your problem differs from the one I discovered, I am pretty sure that there are common roots
I use win XP 32 bit. The issue I meant (different from yours, Rainer, but yours is of course valid too) is that on the font color icon you MUST hit the tiny narrow arrow to pick a color - but on the background icon you can click anywhere (it's not split). I might understand the logic in why the UI designer or normal user doesn't want the color picker to appear when she clicks the icon to change the font color - but why, then, is the background icon not like that too?
Created attachment 47328 [details] Screenshot of where to click the font and background color icons.
*** Bug 42029 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***
I'm afraid I completely misunderstood the original report concerning "Clikcing font color icon doesn't open menu", please excuse me for the confusion. The current situation with "LibreOffice 3.4.4RC1 - WIN7 Home Premium (64bit) German UI [OOO340m1 (Build:401)]" is: aa) In WRITER color pickers for font color and font background are 2 area pickers. Clicking on the small arrowdown opens the picker palette, clicking the big area with the icon will transfer the color that has been used for the last action (and is visible in the icon) to the selected (highlighted) text area. That is very useful. ab) In WRITER color picker for paragraph background is a single area picker. Clicking anywhere within the icon will oen the picker palette. That is very WORRYING. I can't see any reason why this icon has a different behavior. ac) Most (all?) similar other WRITER pickers, for example in 'Table toolbar', have behavior "ab". In CALC, DRQW, IMPRESS the situation differs: All color pickers are single area pickers bringing up the picker palette. Something curious: in "LibreOffice Portable 3.3.3 - WIN7 Home Premium (64bit) German UI [OOO330m19 (Build:301 Tag 3.3.3.1)]" we had a 2 area font color picker design, but it worked as a single area picker. Related Bugs might be Bug 36646 - Unusable font color / colour picker in Impress and Calc Bug 34178 - colorpicker: Change background/font color with one click Bug 32376 - [EasyHack] Set default color to the current one in toolbar popups But all that observations are something for a different report concerning UI unification. The original report was concerning a "does nothing" problem, what seems to be a user error. - something happens, highlghted text will get new font color - if nothing is highlighted, nothing can get a new color, and so it would be absolutely correct if "really nothing happens". I think we should close this bug and reopen "Bug 42029 - can't access pickers with smaller LO window". @filkin: You reported for CALC, but I believe you wanted to report for WRITER? Do you agree with my conclusions?
Reproduced on LibO 3.5.0 beta 2 on Fedora 64 bit Some explanations about original report: there are 3 icons "Font color", "Highlight color" and "Background color" (see second screenshot) First 2 icons start brush when nothing selected, 3-th icon not starts brush, but color picker. This done intentedly. Try place mouse over each icon. We see that first 2 icon are separated from arrow at right hand side, and 3-th icon is combined with arrow. This is not a bug. Other thing if some text selected. First 2 icon apply color imediately, last icon opens color chooser. If "Extended tips" enabled, user can read all this and be not confused. So it my be not a bug at all. But my You have some interesting idea how improve LibreOffice? Then tell us. Thanks
May be that the current behavior is intended, but I do not understand that intention, please also see "Bug 44611 - UI: Paragraph Background Color picker behavior inconsistent" We have discussed so many different issues here, I am going to loose overview and would like to close this one. @sasha: Thank you for the hint with extended tips". You tested WRITER? @Björn: Will you proceed anything here or do you agree with closing?
Yes, with Writer
NOTABUG, de to Comment 9 the current behavior seems intended. @filkin, sasha: Can you please check "Bug 44611 - UI: Paragraph Background Color picker behavior inconsistent" (what IMHO matches with filin's concerns) what questions the current behavior?