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Context Menus

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On Windows Mobile-based Pocket PCs, a context menu displays additional commands for a screen item. The context menu appears when a user taps and holds the stylus on the screen item. If the user taps any other area of the screen, the context menu disappears.

Behavior

On Windows Mobile–based Pocket PC devices, context menus behave as follows:

  • When a user taps and holds the stylus on a specific element on the screen, that element is selected and receives focus.

  • If the stylus is not moved, an animated series of dots begins to circle the point that the user has tapped. This indicates that the next screen will be displayed.

  • If the stylus is not moved and the dot animation completes its circle, the animated dots disappear and a context menu appears.

  • If the user taps any area of the screen other than the context menu, the context menu disappears without taking an action.

Label Attributes

On Windows Mobile–based Pocket PC devices, use the following guidelines for context menu labels:

  • Menu label: 8pt Tahoma bold and title capitalization.
  • Menu item labels: 9pt Tahoma bold and title capitalization.

Development Considerations

Consider the following when you include context menus in an application:

  • Where possible, display the context menu to the right of and below the screen item.
  • In general, actions available on the context menu should be redundantly placed in menus and buttons on the menu bar.
  • Extensibility across the device is still in progress. There is currently only partial coverage. In addition, there are two different implementations that need to be consolidated: personal information manager (PIM) and shell.
  • To minimize stylus movement, list commands from top to bottom in order of expected frequency of use.
  • Actions that are difficult to recover from, such as delete, should be placed at the bottom of the context menu to increase the distance from the original stylus position.

See Also

User Interface Control Guidelines | Capitalization and Punctuation Guidelines | List Boxes | List Views | ToolTips

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