Re: Eliminate titlebar for maximized windows

[Calum Benson <Calum Benson Sun COM>]

On 20 Jan 2009, at 15:09, Jay Bee wrote:

> IMHO, titlebar just wastes precious screen real estate so when an user
> maxemizes a window the whole window border would grow outside the  
> screen
> and dissappear, while the titlebar would be shrinked in the panel  
> window
> list (I used ubuntu-mobile window picker here).
> That window list item would display title, restore and close buttons.
> Clicking on the title would minimize the window so there is no need  
> for
> minimize button here.

What you're describing sounds similar to full screen mode (as seen in  
gnome-terminal, epiphany et al), but leaving the panels visible... and  
in some ways it does seem sub-optimal to support both maximised and  
full screen modes.

One problem with any full screen mode, though, is that all the usual  
points of reference for manipulating the window suddenly disappear, so  
the user's cognitive load is increased while they try to figure out  
how to restore the prior state.  (Admittedly, that's also because many  
apps with a full screen mode tend to implement it somewhat  
differently... sometimes they leave a mini-titlebar, sometimes a  
floating toolbar, sometimes nothing at all-- the HIG does recommend a  
standard way of doing it, but it doesn't seem to be very popular.)

FWIW, the titlebar does have another use in maximised mode, for some  
people-- it allows the maximised window to be rolled-up/shaded, by  
double-clicking.  Again, that *could* be done via the menu in the  
window list instead, for example, but forcing the user to do the same  
task differently depending on which mode is in effect does tend to  
trouble usability folks...

> Another thing I would like to discuss is the menu bar... almost every
> window has it and I think most users use it rarely

That sounds like a fairly sweeping generalisation to me-- show us your  
user data :)

FWIW, OS X implements one possible compromise for both the issues you  
raise, by having a button in the titlebar for toggling the display of  
the toolbar-- in GNOME's case, it could toggle the display of the menu  
bar as well.  You'd still lose the titlebar real estate in maximised  
mode, but at least with one extra click you could hide all the other  
extraneous stuff, with a consistent way to bring it back again.  (With  
the added advantage that you could also hide that stuff when the  
window wasn't maximised, if you wished...)

Cheeri,
Calum.

--
CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer       Sun Microsystems Ireland
mailto:calum benson sun com            OpenSolaris Desktop Team
http://blogs.sun.com/calum             +353 1 819 9771

Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems