Re: New GNOME UI Proposal

["Jared White" <jwhite sonic net>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jörg Rathlev" <joerg jrsoftware de>


> > Here's the address of the proposal, complete with fake
> > screenshots/mock-ups:
> >
> > http://www.jaredwhite.com/ngui/index.html
>
> Well, it certainly looks good at a first glance.

Thanks, I tried really hard to make the mock-ups look "real" for
visualization purposes.

> I'd agree with your friend, but I don't really like the application
> bar as you designed it anyway. First, have you ever worked with
> Explorer set to single click mode? It's exciting when you first try
> it, but the only thing it somewhat simplifies is *opening* files,
> while it makes *managing* files so much harder.

OK, well I have used Explorer in single click mode exclusively since MS
implemented that feature. It's one of the few UI inventions MS has come up
with that really impresses me. You said it simplifies opening files
somewhat -- well that's what this Applications Panel is all about. I didn't
design it to make *managing* apps easier so much as I designed it to make
*launching* apps easier. However, I have to admit MS actually defaults to
using the standard double click method for Explorer, which gives me an idea.
The Applications Panel could default to a "click to select, double-click to
launch" usage and more advanced users could switch to the other usage if
they wanted to. What do you think of that?

> What's wrong about making the Application Launcher a menu?

With categories and application lists part of the same widget? How could you
make that into menu?

> Ok, it's harder to integrate things like your "make launcher"
> feature.

Yes, it is!

> But is "hover for 1/3 of a second" really an obvious way,
> even if there is the button? I don't think so. However I don't have a
> good idea on how to achieve something similar with a menu, other than
> either using a menu editor, or using a context menu inside a menu
> (please don't).

The point of the Applications Panel is to make it easy to launch
applications. Click on a category, click (or double-click) on an app, and
bam! It's launched. Click, click, bam. And, unlike a regular menu, the
Applications Panel would stay in the state it was left in. So if I needed to
launch several different Web browsers to test my Web page in, I could just
pull the Applications Panel out into the desktop area, go into the Internet
category, and keep clickin' away until all the browsers were launched. Try
that with a huge menu/submenu system. :)

> > Also, I moved the buttons around a bit in the mock-up with the
alternative
> > position of the Applications Bar -- that's probably not a good idea, but
I
> > thought maybe different button positions would make the most important
> > buttons easier to hit quickly. Again, when you look at the proposal this
> > should make sense.
>
> You need some labels on those buttons, I think. Their meaning isn't
> really clear by looking at the icons, and even with other icons, the
> buttons are so important that you'd want some extra information (by
> default, at least).

Good idea. My only concern is how to label those icons without making the
buttons really large. Any ideas?

Thanks for the feedback. I'm positive my proposal can be tweaked a whole
bunch as necessary when people have concerns, which is I why I think
basically it's a strong design. It's just a matter of finding the common
ground for how different people like to use their computers, and then making
that the default usage.

Regards,

Jared