Microsoft mentions the toast as a visual element in the package manifest for Metro-style apps with the attribute ToastCapable="true".
What does this mean?
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Rahul
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Dave Andersen
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1First result I got for ToastCapable: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090907203233AADs1Xe – Patrick McElhaney Sep 27 '11 at 18:02
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Haha I got that too Patrick but this was my first result, which shouldn't have far down on yours either. – Matt Rockwell Sep 27 '11 at 19:09
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3@Matt, This may be nit-picking, but that link just describes how to create one, and some vague details (it's a notification, it requires a sound, you can launch an app from it) but not a complete picture of what it really is. There's no clean explanation like Ben provided on that page. – Dave Andersen Sep 27 '11 at 22:00
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Okay, well I admit that if I had searched a bit harder, I should have found this Wikipedia article. I suppose I could delete the question, but I did find Ben's answer and comment pretty interesting. – Dave Andersen Sep 27 '11 at 22:14
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11Hopefully the next person won't have to search so hard because this question will show up near the top of the results. It's a good question and good answer. – Patrick McElhaney Sep 27 '11 at 22:56
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1I guess I see your points now about getting UX.SE to show up in Google as the first result. I was just following the logic that if you could Google it and find the answer with little to no effort, that it was not a good question because we were supposed to be providing something beyond what Google offers – Matt Rockwell Sep 28 '11 at 11:07
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2@MattRockwell The problem with most results on Google is that when someone asks a question, they get a non-Q&A site. Here I get a clear picture of the definition of a toast, a clear indication of the "correct" answer and the top voted answer, and I don't have to dig through 8 pages of a forum thread or 20 paragraphs on wikipedia to find it. – Ben Brocka Sep 28 '11 at 13:15
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@BenBrocka True. So where does the line get drawn then? Should we have questions like "What is a Modal Window?" etc? If so I have no problem creating them and cataloging that type of information on here if that's what we want to do. – Matt Rockwell Sep 28 '11 at 13:27
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2Honestly I wish people did stuff like that all the time, I love when I get a Stack Overflow question in search results instead of various tech forums, even if a forum thread answers the question. I've never been as clear on SE's policy on stuff like that though, since you're basically asking a question you know the answer to. – Ben Brocka Sep 28 '11 at 13:38
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@Rahul - I think you're missing the point of "the Google test". The point is that there's no reason to ask a question here that you could just paste into Google and already get the exact answer you are looking for. Matt is correct with his assumption - there's no reason to have questions like "What is a modal dialog?" on a SE site. – Charles Boyung Sep 29 '11 at 21:11
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1Regardless of the Google test, isn't this a question that belongs on SO instead of here? The question is about a technical term, not a UX term. – Charles Boyung Sep 29 '11 at 21:14
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5@CharlesBoyung it's a method of interacting with the user, it's a UX term. He found it from a technical manual, but what you call a notification is important in UX design. Just because code calls something a window doesn't mean it's not a window to us too. – Ben Brocka Sep 29 '11 at 23:07
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I don't find the word "toast" in the Micro$oft link. – Nicolas Barbulesco Jan 09 '15 at 10:08
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2I think this question and answers would be improved by covering why it's called toast. Lots of other inedible things popup, but we don't have poptart, eggo or strudel notifications either... – Patrick M Jan 09 '15 at 18:20
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1@PatrickM While an eggo notification would be nice I believe the "toast" notification is based on toasting a drink in honor of someone/something – DasBeasto May 05 '16 at 20:27
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@DasBeasto that's exactly why I'm here - I can't figure out if it's a toast as in toaster because it "pops up" or as in the social ritual because it's a brief announcement. – Travis Christian Sep 02 '16 at 21:59
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I like the term "flash message" from Ruby on Rails (RoR) better. – Pete Alvin Apr 18 '21 at 20:10
6 Answers
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A Toast is a non modal, unobtrusive window element used to display brief, auto-expiring windows of information to a user. Android OS makes relatively heavy use of them.
Here's an example of a Google Chrome toast notification on Mac OS X:
A list of descriptions of Toast windows on multiple platforms:
Ben Brocka
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6The name is sort of odd, I did a whole student-research experiment on them and one of the biggest problems was how the heck to refer to them. They were just "the notification" to users. – Ben Brocka Sep 27 '11 at 16:54
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1Also another point mentioned in the Android guide there is that the user doesn't interact with the notifications - they don't accept user input. Though, I've found that toasts may become a bit obtrusive when there's not much screen real estate, so I'd have them interact purely so that you can close / hide them (e.g. to see what's behind them). – jamiebarrow Jul 04 '12 at 11:31
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Luke Wroblewski in this blog post describes a use of this real time notification:
.. and added a site-wide system of real time notifications that tell you when someone you follow on Bagcheck creates, likes or comments on something. You can see one of these notifications in action in the animated image below. A little "toast" window appears in the upper right hand corner of your screen when someone cooks up a new update.
Also worth noting from the Android Developer Guide:
but it does not take focus (or pause the current activity), so it cannot accept user input
Kartik G
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Though variations now exist that CAN take user input. Intuitively [/s], they're called "snackbars" – Scott Odle Jan 24 '15 at 01:53
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I learned the term from working with Android as well. We use them all the time to provide brief notifications "Item Saved to Favorites" is a common one. I think the biggest difference from a pop-up is that they are "auto-expiring." So anything with an OK/Cancel option would not be considered a toast. As for the origin of the term it could either be a reference to it popping up like toasted bread or like a dinner party toast "Something happened..Cheers!"
AmyLM
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It means the application can provide alerts or notifications. From Metro Style Apps - VisualElements
Here is more information: Creating and managing tiles, toast, and Windows push notifications and Quickstart: Creating a toast notification
Editor's info: Above links are from 2011 (or beginning of 2012). Microsoft has changed a lot since then.
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As this is an outdated thread I think it is important to add 'recent' information about "Toasts" notifications
From Google Android:
The Snackbar class supersedes Toast. While Toast is currently still supported, Snackbar is now the preferred way to display brief, transient messages to the user.
Alternatives to using toasts If your app is in the foreground, consider using a snackbar instead of using a toast. Snackbars include user-actionable options, which can provide a better app experience.
If your app is in the background, and you want users to take some action, use a notification instead.
From Material UI:
Generally, snackbars are the preferred mechanism for displaying feedback messages to users, as they can be displayed in the context of the UI where the action occurred. Reserve Toast for cases where this cannot be done.
https://developer.android.com/training/snackbar/
https://material.io/components/snackbars/android#using-snackbars
Daniel Perez
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