No visual indication upon choosing another WiFi network

I should add: show what NM is doing in a hint text (cursor hovering over the NM icon) while reconnecting. When there is a connection, a hint text shows info about that connection, but when it is reconnecting, there's no hint anymore.

I believe when it fails to make a connection, it displays a "Network Disconnected" notification before attempting to join another network. Is this correct, Ivan? Or does it really show nothing?

Perhaps we could instead display a "Could not connect to X" notification, with a message like "Trying to join network 'Y' instead."

I'm quite sure it does show "Network disconnected", as if it was connected and then disconnected.

I'm sorry, but I don't fully understand the bug. Are we trying to get OSD to say "Could not connect to X" like David suggested instead of "Network disconnected"?

At the moment OSD displays "Network X Disconnected" and "Network X Connection established".
I guess those statements could be made a bit more friendly, but I don't think that's what this paper cut is about.

I'm also not quite sure what is wanted in the original post, but the comment about the lack of mouseover text while connecting is valid.

Looks like I was too short in description :-).

Here's a situation. I have two free networks listed under Network Manager menu. I am currently disconnected. I choose the first network and wait for some time if it connects. If it doesn't I choose the second one from the menu. And here's the paper cut:

- the icon just keeps spinning as it was
- no alerts about connecting to the second network appear
- if you open up a menu it has the first network selected

The situation is not uncommon: it happens at every tech conference that has several access point that my notebook never seen before. I also must say I'm writing it now from memory so I might be wrong in some detail.

There's also another thing in the same vein. What I has described before happens if I was initially disconnected (i.e. a notebook didn't find any known network upon coming alive somewhere). If on the other hand I *am* connected (say, to some 'WiFi1') and want to change network and try several new networks ('WiFi2', 'WiFi3') then OSD will show an alert that I'm disconnected from 'WiFi1' each time I choose another network. It looks awkward because If I was already disconnected then being disconnected again doesn't make sense.

I suggest to also make a notification when Network Manager is connecting. So you easily follow what Network Manager is doing.

Current notification behaviour
1 You start your pc, Network manager tries to connect to a wireless network. No notification.
2 Network Manager has succesfully connected. Notification: 'Wireless Nm', Connection established
3 You are out of range. Notification: 'Wireless Nm', Disconnected
4 You connect to another network. No Notification.
5 You select yet another network. Still no notification at what Network manager is doing.

Proposed notification:
1 You start your pc. Notification: 'Wireless Nm', Connecting...
2 Network Manager has succesfully connected. Notification: 'Wireless Nm', Connection established
3 You are out of range. Notification: 'Wireless Nm', Disconnected
4 You connect to another network. Notification: 'W2', Connecting...
5 You select yet another network. Notification: 'W3', Connecting...

From what I'm reading, this papercut is about step 5. So introducing 'connecting...' messages should solve this papercut.

The nm-applet icon animation is enough indication that the computer is responding to the user action. Furthermore, we generally want to avoid displaying notifications in direct response to user action, as it's generally redundant; choosing to join the network "Turtle" and immediately seeing a notification with the message "Joining network 'Turtle'" may seem patronizing.

Since this bug was describing pre-Karmic behavior it's indeed not valid right now. However in Karmic network connection notification has its own problems. I could file a new ticket or we can reopen this one. Or we can forget about it :-).

please reopen if the issue still exists in Ubuntu 12.04

I guess this has been solved already. When you disconnect from a network by choosing another network, the name of the new network appears in the dropdown-list, just above 'Disconnect....'. And because you can see by the flickering icon that the connection has not been made, you have all the elements in which you can determine the network status (name + connection status).

[Expired for Ubuntu network, Bluetooth, keyboard menus because there has been no activity for 60 days.]

[Expired for network-manager-applet (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]