On 2019-03-25 7:19 a.m., Emmanuele Bassi via desktop-devel-list wrote:
> Which would achieve nothing except, once again, shoving icons and menus
> into one of the most important pieces of screen real estate we have just
> because some application developers simply cannot live without their
> application icons being visible at all times.
Is that a joke?
No.
On a default gnome install on any modern screen, only
about 25% of the top bar contains any information at all. It can't be
"the most important real estate" and be so underutilized.
It's important because it's the UI element that is *always visible* at all times.
Not every square millimeter of your screen need to be lit up by something that can be interacted by the user.
Same reasoning
why it is rare to have a park in the middle of downtown.
I literally have no idea what this even means.
That said, notification icons are literally the most useful information
points for the many applications I have running in the background. So
they deserve prominent placement.
If an application is in the background, why do you need to see an icon all the time?
If the application needs to notify you of any state change while it's hidden, it can use a notification; if you need an icon to interact with a background application, you can literally re-launch it from the dash or from the applications grid, and you'll get an application window.
If there are no state changes and you don't need to interact with it, then the icon is pointless waste of space.
You think "application developers simply cannot live without their
application icons being visible at all times"? That's why Windows lets
you hide them. Problem solved. Like, since XP in 2001.
It's so much solved by Windows that tray icons are discouraged there as well, and are generally left for legacy applications or custom hardware settings.
Ciao,
Emmanuele.
