Skip to content

Clarify docs around usage of help icon for tooltip/popover text #1332

@mcoker

Description

@mcoker

Reported by @christianvogt via slack:

It's a little unclear whether <HelpIcon> or <OutlinedQuestionCircleIcon> is the recommended icon for help text (triggers a tooltip/popover for contextual help). Specifically in the context of a field label in a form.

In all of the places I looked across PF components that support help text triggered via an icon, we're using <HelpIcon>, which is part of our custom icon set. The SVG code is in core (source) and used to create the <HelpIcon> seen on this page which shows all of the icons in @patternfly/react-icons - https://react-staging.patternfly.org/icons. Here's a screenshot, along with <OutlinedQuestionCircleIcon>:

Screenshot 2024-08-13 at 7 40 41 PM Screenshot 2024-08-13 at 7 48 16 PM

However, in the icons table on https://www.patternfly.org/design-foundations/icons#all-icons, only the FA icons are listed and "fa-question-circle (outlined)" says "Indicates the availability of contextual help".

In the form design guidelines, the wording is "In a form, indicate a popover with an unfilled question mark circle that reveals information when clicked."

In the popover design guidelines, the wording is "When using a default popover to define a term or explain a concept, use a gray question-circle icon."

If someone were to ask me which icon to use, I would recommend <HelpIcon> to match the icons used in PF components. However, if someone were to reference the design guidelines on org, I think they would assume <OutlinedQuestionCircleIcon> is the correct icon to use.

I guess the questions are:

  • Is there a preferred/recommended icon to use, or can they be used interchangeably?
  • If our components use <HelpIcon>, should we mention that in these (or other) docs/design guidelines on org?

Metadata

Metadata

Assignees

No one assigned

    Labels

    No labels
    No labels

    Type

    No type

    Projects

    Status

    Needs triage

    Milestone

    No milestone

    Relationships

    None yet

    Development

    No branches or pull requests

    Issue actions