Hi Camille, welcome to the forum \o/
I totally see the point of grouping the video component extensions in one place. And I agree that there is a problem with having multiple extensions displayed at the same time and using buttons to open/close them.
Background
The problem I have with having a forced background that takes all the space is that it just seems to an “easy way” and not a “smart way”. As I said, I wouldn’t mind to add myself a semi-opaque background that matches the content of my extension to mark the limit of the space used at a given time but forcing it to the full size will limit a lot the possibilities of an extension because it won’t be flexible at all.
For example, a potential breaking point here would be customization for streamers. Let’s say I want a display with cards and another with lines. But I want to let the streamer choose to fit their stream style. The card type would be more horizontal while the list style more vertical. But I would need a bigger space to have both options available but with this update, it would not be possible to offer such customization since I can’t have a different space.
I really feel like the problem of having a click on a video overlay extension blocked by a video component extension should not be solved by extensions developers but by Twitch developers because it’s dependent on the architecture created by Twitch. And yes I know it’s not easy.
An idea for a potential solution would be to allow multiple fixed sizes for an extension.
For example,
- 30% height and a 1:1 ratio
- 30% height and a 2:1 ratio
- etc
With it, we could always take the space we need but be flexible since we can determine the different extension sizes. Since we will have a fixed place, changing the size of an extension during the runtime would not be a real problem if we still indicate to the viewers the size it takes with a background.
Top bar
For the top bar, my problem is that I don’t see video component extensions as “windows”. For me, video component extensions are not typical webpages they are made for interactive video and live with the stream.
If I want to make a webpage in a window I will not design it the same way I would design something for interactive video.
So applying a windowing system is, in my opinion, going against the immersion in the stream because it will really feel like a pop-up and not something that is made to be there.
On the other hand, panels extension should be designed as webpages, because they are living on their own space, can be popped out, and are meant to be informative even if we see some interactive extension there too.
The question
The point of my question was not about the type of extension I should build. but the design approach of the different extension types. Why should I design a video component the same way I design a panel extension? As you said they don’t serve the same purpose, and as I pointed they don’t live in the same place, so they should have different UX/UI codes and not be aligned in a similar windowed way.
Some thoughts other stuff about this update
- After this update, you will see a “war” to get the video overlay place. Not because people want to use all the space, but because they will need to have information displayed at some point depending on the action of other streamers or viewers. For example notification or community actions.
- I noticed the purple dots but we still don’t know what they are used for is it possible to have a bit more information
? - Where will the bits transaction pop up appears now
?