Re: [Usability] Taking Advantage of Spatial Memory with the GS Window Picker

[Allan Day <allanpday gmail com>]

Hey Allan! (Our names being the same still cracks me up!)

<snip>
> This is my recommendation inspired by Firefox Panorama. Like on the
> dash, let's take advantage of the user's spatial memory by attaching a
> fixed linear relationship between windows. It'll still be flexible by
> allowing to user to manually rearrange windows, so the user can
> meaningfully sort them. The approach here is just a bit different from
> the Dash or Window Picker, because there's a bigger real estate
> allocated, but the principles would be fundamentally similar. 
</snip>

Really interesting idea! I like it a lot.

You are definitely right about the window picker problem. The seemingly
arbitrary arrangement of the window picker definitely does not help with
finding the window that you want.

What I'm not so sure about is the idea of manual rearrangement. My view,
which I think is consistent with the design approach behind the shell,
is to take as much user management out of the system as possible. The
user shouldn't have to manage their windows, since the shell should be
doing the managing for them.

Instead of manual rearrangement, you could order windows according to
the sequence in which they were opened, or the order in which they were
viewed (there could even be possibilities for alt-tab integration
there).

One issue that I don't see addressed in your mockup is the normally
irregular shapes and sizes of windows - how will your regular grid be
achieved?

Allan

-- 
Blog: http://afaikblog.wordpress.com/
IRC: aday on irc.gnome.org