Re: Proposal: gnome-main-menu for inclusion in GNOME 2.18

[Martin Ejdestig <marejde gmail com>]

On Sat, 2006-10-21 at 11:23 +0200, Luca Ferretti wrote:
> > The default panel layout in GNOME looks like some inane mix of Mac
> > OS and Windows, and has been a point of confusion for many people
> > switching over.
> 
> But there are also long time GNOME users that are fine with current
> panel menu applet. Myself for example. Or my sister.
> 
> Or Martin Eidestig :-)

Jeez! :) I was not vehemently defending the current panel menu layout.
Can it be improved? Sure. Is it useful to compare it to what's in OS X?
I doubt it. If the goal was to clone I guess it's a spectacular failure.
(I say guess because I haven't used OS X enough to remember what's in
it.) And I guess the same goes for slab with relation to the windows
start menu.

> >  The significance of how
> > much it is like, or unlike, a similar specific interface on Windows or
> > Mac OS, is that we need to define our target audience. Without a target,
> > we can't reasonably say what is truly best for the desktop.
> 
> Our target is 10x10, isn't it? :-)

10% of what though? I don't know if personas is the right answer but
Havoc sent out a mail almost 4 years ago talking about it:

http://mail.gnome.org/archives/desktop-devel-list/2002-December/msg00482.html

> Should GNOME include slab? IMHO, yes, while there are some relevant
> stuff that should be fixed or rearranged IMHO (see below)
> 
> Should GNOME switch to slab and dump current panel menu applet? IMHO,
> no. I don't know what could be the better layout for GNOME panel, of if
> it exists. I know that some users are fine with current layout, some
> others could appreciate slab.
> 
> The best solution is provide both, as well as Nautilus do with spatial
> and browser. This is not good for the first GNOME directive (be simple)
> and is not so K.I.S.S. but it should be effective for 10x10.

Don't know if most users will even notice the alternative that isn't the
default. If both are included I guess it's up to the distributions to
set the default...


Martin
-- 
http://coiley.zapto.org/~martin