Re: Revisiting the GNOME Panel in general...

[Trent Lloyd <lathiat bur st>]

Hi,

On Wed, Sep 22, 2004 at 03:06:50PM +0100, Scott James Remnant wrote:
> This is something that's been itching at me for a while, and Jeff
> prodded me in the direction of the list and Davyd's blog post[0].  As
> I'm not on Planet GNOME I figured I'd reply on the list instead.
> 
> Davyd identified three kinds of applets, I'd like to actually expand on
> that list a little bit:
> 
>  * Applets directly related to a program.
> 
>    This includes most of the current notification icons, especially
>    Gaim, Gossip and Rhythmbox.  I think this also includes the current
>    CD Player applet.
> 
>    And (possibly) controversially, I think this also includes Launchers.
> 
>    If I put a CD Player launcher on my panel and click it, Sound Juicer
>    (probably) should appear.  Why can't I subsequently use that launcher
>    as if it were the old CD Player applet?
> 
>    Or another example.  Click the Rhythmbox icon to start it, that icon
>    should subsequently serves the same purpose as the current
>    notification icon.
I think this would be cool, i think MacOSX does something simlar in that
the launcher becomes the way to maximize it/minimize it, not a
notification icon.

Though, this isnt suited to everything as sometimes youwant more than
one of something open, how do you distinguish between them?

>  * Applets directly related to hardware.
> 
>    I pretty much agree with Davyd here.  Plugging in or activating
>    hardware should add the appropriate applet to the panel, removing
>    that hardware should remove it again.
> 
>    Laptops would get a battery applet because they have one, desktops
>    wouldn't, etc.
>
>
>  * Applets directly related to information.
> 
>    These are the informational ones such as pagers, clocks, weather,
>    etc.  They're there because the user added them (or got them in their
>    default profile and haven't removed them).
> 
> 
> To handle all of this, the Panel definitely needs to be a lot more
> intelligent about placement of applets.  If I disable then re-enable the
> bluetooth in my laptop the (theoretical) applet should vanish and then
> reappear in the same position as before.
> 
> The panel would also need some way of knowing where the user likes
> applets to appear.  Starting an application like Rhythmbox from the menu
> would need to place its applet somewhere sensible, and if the user
> doesn't lock it onto the panel it should probably vanish and not turn
> into a launcher when closed.  (You'd probably want to remember the
> location for next time its started though).

The biggest problem I see here is space, if you take your wireless card
out, add some extra stuff it might be forced to overwrite the space the
wireless card applet was in, this poses two problems

a) I plug my wireless card in and its not where its supposed to be
b) Theres stuff where I expected my wireless card to be

And as part of A, even if it moves the other stuff out of the way, it
will move so you expect that to be somewhere else then, but where,
yadda yadda yadda, i could go on.

With applets there all the time we know what stuff is there and when we
are running out of roo.

Just stuff to think about, im sure it can be solved somehow with the
thinking of someone smarter than me :)

Cheers,
Trent

-- 
Trent Lloyd <lathiat bur st>
Bur.st Networking Inc.