Re: Recently used applications

[axel c <axel banzais org>]

On Mon, 2002-10-28 at 23:52, Dave Bordoley wrote:
> 
> The rationale for recent documents is that it moves the interface
> towards a more document centered approach, hence users can think about
> the objects they want to manipulate rather than the tools they want to
> use to manipulate them with. This feature is a real step forward.
> 

I fully agree with this. I think the desktop as a whole should be
'object-oriented' rather than 'process-oriented' (not speaking about the
programming here, that is irrelevant to the user). He/she just knows
that clicking on a document allows him to edit it again.Taking this
approacb to the extreme, the user shouldn't even need (stress "need") to
know the name of the app he uses for listening to mp3's, or writing
letters, or watching camera pictures. So i think the 'recent files'
thing, is a great interface enhancement. and i think the right place
would be at the very top of the menu, since 'top-left' is the part of
the fovea (visual area) that is processed by the brain first, this is an
automatic perception process (guess why the 'File' menu has always been
top-left).

Of course, this document-oriented orientation is annoying to some users,
so the 'make it an option' axyom remains valid here...


> Recent applications on the other hand would be an arbitrary category of
> applications that have no relation to each other than they have been
> recently used. IMO, having such category just shows inadequacies in the
> existing menu categories (if there are any, i don't know if theres a
> problem in gnome, but in windows i suspect this is the reason for the
> feature). 

death to the 'Recent applications' menu entry! (see above)

:)

cheers,

axel