Re: Two proposals for Gnome-shell

[David Prieto <frandavid100 gmail com>]

Hey Jesse,

My personal feeling is that there's no easy solution for showing what's in different workspaces in a quick and efficient way. The current solution, while it certainly isn't perfect, makes the most sense to me, and the large thumbnails actually do help me in this case more than icons, because the configuration of windows tells me something about what is running there (I usually layout different windows differently, in specific patterns, etc). I agree that showing icons would make it quicker and easier to find a given app. But, the proposed solution is less visually appealing to me and can hide more information in the case of the same app running in different spaces (also doesn't show the visual layout/structure of the space).

I'll be honest here: I don't think the current WS thumbnails do a good job at showing what is on each workspace. At all. If anything, they show more or less what each of them would look from far, far away. But windows in them look mostly the same, and to top that, most windows appear partially or completely covered from the one on top.

What I think does a superb job at conveying what's in each workspace is the window picker. It shows windows whole and at a good size, so that you can recognize them instantly. The only problem with it is that it's difficult to switch to each space, but that's also partially due to the way the workspace preview works: you have to open Activities, then move all the way to the right to bring up the WS thumbnails, then look at the tiny thumbnails and guess which workspace you're looking for, click it to open its overlay and then click it again (or the desired window) to close Activities.

I think all of it would be much handier if the workspaces were integrated into the sidebar and you could do one of these:

• using the mouse, click Activities, go down to the sidebar and push the cursor against the left edge to widen the sidebar. Then hover over each workspace to switch to it and see its windows, without having to click. When you see the workspace you want, select the desired window either by clicking its icon or by clicking the window itself. You get the same effect but only clicking once, with less mouse movement, and the window overlay represents what's in each workspace much better than a thumbnail could ever do.
• Using the keyboard, press Super, which should highlight the sidebar (more specifically, the active window in the active workspace). From there, press left to widen the sidebar (enter the sidebar's "workspace mode") and press up / down to switch to another workspace. Or press right to open each icon's right-click menu. Admittedly that wouldn't be as handy as using the mouse, but it would still let you switch workspaces, apps and windows much more easily than having two separate sidebars.

Please give it a minute and try to imagine how that would operate. Wouldn't you like that?