#4 on ToDo list: make the top panel prettier

[Brian Fleeger <brianfleeger yahoo com>]

Hi all,

I want to make a couple of suggestions for how to improve the looks of the top panel.  Please see the attached png image.  Biggest suggestions are: taller panel (~43 pxls, give or take);smaller (16 pxl) notification icons with sufficient space between them (avoiding crowding); stacked clock and action widgets; possible analogue clock widget/eye candy.  (Reference: pillaged ideas from Hylke Bons' blog http://www.bomahy.nl/hylke/blog/ugly-notification-area-in-gnome/ )

I have one question: with the part of the top panel next to the activities button empty, are there any plans to use global menus to more effectively use that wide open space?  Is it going to go fallow?  Although the issue of task management and app launching has yet to be resolved, I cannot help but think you would either want to put a task manager or app launcher there, or use it for some type of global menu. 

There is already a Global Menu Bar for Gnome which hase reached the 0.7 stage of development: http://code.google.com/p/gnome2-globalmenu/  It is stable and compatible with most of the apps I use now (firefox and OO.o being two very big exceptions). 

Alternatively, it could be made like the Sugar OS's picture-based "menu" system running along the top of the screen just under the panel.  This would be like a best of both worlds from the Mac OS X and Office 2007's Ribbon (See: http://content.zdnet.com/2346-12355_22-183268-7.html ) 

Regards,
Brian

Attachment: Double Layer With Analogue Clock.png
Description: PNG image