Shoutbox

ok i understand what your saying, perhaps another way round all the problems you highlighted is when you click add/edit nickname in contact list or set nickname on a desktop contact and your actually there with the name in an editable state, perhaps you could at that point do some shortcut like ctrl+g that would initiate the gradiater interface for entering the nickname, after all i believe thats how the colour used to work in the old days right you did ctrl+n or p or whatever it was and colour panel appeared so this new idea for an inteerface might be easier to impliment.

regarding my 2 suggestions of adding items to right click menus i didnt know if it was possible or not i merely suggested a possible interface but any interface for accessing the gradiater will do.