But, I'd argue the concept is the same. A tool tip is used for times when the on-screen cue has been abbreviated. Either as a picture or a short caption. For example if I have a column header that would 3 or 4 words to describe what the column is and the column data is boolean. I--and users, in my experience--think it's not advantageous to use so much real-estate.

I wouldn't ever "build my own" for this for the reason you describe. I would definately use a "natural" one though.


>Finally, we decided against it on a consensus decision that tooltips should only be used on toolbars, anyway, the only place they're really standard...