Is this the preferred way to merge TextStyles (in ...

# compose

[Kevin Hester]

Is this the preferred way to merge TextStyles (in this case picking a standard style and then bumping down the opacity)?

Text(
    text = "9:49 AM",
    modifier = LayoutPadding(left = 8.dp),
    style = MaterialTheme.typography().caption.merge(
        TextStyle(
            color = palette.onSecondary.copy(
                alpha = 0.2f
            )
        )
    )
)

If so, what about letting TextStyles have an + operator to make their usage more similar to Modifiers?

[Louis Pullen-Freilich [G]]

In this example, you can just use .copy(color =... instead of needing to fully merge.

Although instead of copying text styles and changing opacity, you should take a look at ProvideEmphasis - it's intended for the use case of modifying opacity of some content

[Kevin Hester]

ooh thanks a lot I'll take a look at ProvideEmphasis!

[Louis Pullen-Freilich [G]]

https://developer.android.com/reference/kotlin/androidx/ui/material/package-summary.html#ProvideEmphasis(androidx.ui.material.Emphasis,%20kotlin.Function0)

Here's docs / samples

[Kevin Hester]

thanks! worked great.

ProvideEmphasis(emphasis = MaterialTheme.emphasisLevels().disabled) {
    Text(
        text = dateFormat.format(msg.date),
        modifier = LayoutPadding(left = 8.dp),
        style = MaterialTheme.typography().caption
    )
}

[Louis Pullen-Freilich [G]]

Cool, happy to hear 🙂
Semantically it means a lot more than just copying an alpha value too, so I think it's a nice way of expressing alpha

[Kevin Hester]

yep - though I'd say in this case I'm not really trying to convey "disabled" as much as I'm trying to convey "minor"

[Kevin Hester]

(and yep - I'm cribbing from the slack look and feel also - I suck at UX)

[Louis Pullen-Freilich [G]]

Yeah, disabled is wrong here for sure. If this doesn't map cleanly to something from the Material spec, I think it would make sense to just create your own emphasis for this component.

val TimestampEmphasis = object: Emphasis {
    override fun emphasize(color: Color) = color.copy(alpha = 0.12f)
}
    
ProvideEmphasis(TimestampEmphasis) { ... }

[Kevin Hester]

ooh! that is nice. thanks again. (I'm a 99% embedded device sw or backend geek ;-))