A few suggestions for Gnome Shell

[Daniel Brodie <dbrodie gmail com>]

Hi,

First let me say that I really like Gnome Shell and really appreciate 
the work that went into it. It feels really solid and polished for a .0 
release. The dynamic workspaces has got me hooked.
I do have a few requests for things that from my >1 month of usage has 
bothered me. I have searched in bugzilla for reports and for what I have 
found or saw in the design docs that there are being changed I didn't 
write up. If I have missed something I apologize beforehand. In 
addition, I also apologize for not making any mockups, my GIMP skills 
are not good in any way, I will have to rely on your imagination. 
Lastly, I apologize for the long email, I didn't intend for it to be so 
long...

Alt+Tab
=====
I would like to point out that the Alt-Tab behavior, in my opinion, can 
sometimes be extremely counter intuitive. If we look at window switching 
in a use case scenario, we have the following cases:
  * Window Hunting: The user want a specific window which he hasn't 
used in a while. This is best solved by the overview and allows by a 
glace to find the window. The Alt-Tab functions as a mediocre 
replacement if need be. Navigation is relatively straight forward. 
Unlike the overview you see less info at a glace but that is expected. 
The only annoyance is switching between the 2 Alt's. This use case is 
handled well by the current situation.
 * Window Managing: The user want to see what he has open to manage his 
windows. (This includes closing unused windows, moving windows between 
workspaces, moving between activities, etc...). Obviously, the overview 
really shines here, but Alt+Tab is descent at seeing what else is 
happening at other workspaces.
 * Quick Switching: A user uses 2-3 windows and switches between them 
rapidly as he continues to do his work. This is an where most people 
don't even look at the switcher and just use quick instincts for this. 
For example, switching between a couple of documents that the user is 
working on simultaneously. Here the overview is poorly suited since it 
doesn't prioritize based on "last used" and requires a mouse which 
really slows down. If the switch is between 2-3 apps that have one 
window or windows of the same app then Alt+Tab or Alt+`, respectively, 
works quite well. The only problem is that a user has to rember which 
Alt+___ shortcut he needs when most users are "programmed" for Alt+Tab 
for a "get me the last window I was on" case.
If the user switches between 2-3 windows of different apps that have 
more than one window, or worse 2 windows from one app and another window 
from a different app then the usage is terrible. The user has to 
continuously remember if he needs to use Alt+Tab or Alt+`, and if he 
does use Alt+Tab for quick switching then a bunch of windows will pop up 
and cover his other used window unless he uses a combination of Alt+Tab 
and Alt+`. While this may be OK for the Window Hunting case where a user 
takes his time to find a window, when a user want to quickly switch 
between windows this is very distracting.

Although I understand the desire to separate between app switching and 
in-app switching, I think this is confusing and ruins the quick use for 
alt-tab. An alternative should focus much more on allowing the user to 
switch between his/her 2 active windows regardless if they are from the 
same app or not.

Applications Overview Tab
================
Currently the all the applications are in an alphabetical view of all 
the applications.
I would like to suggest that instead of the current default view, to 
have a categorical list like the way the search view categories the 
items with headers between each category. Also the category list on the 
right would not hide applications just scroll to the right category.
In the current default application list it is not easy to find the app 
you are looking for since there is too much clutter. Most people are 
going to go for the categories on the right to help them sift/filter 
through them. This means that after going to the overview, hitting the 
applications tab then having to hit one of the categories on the other 
end of the screen and only then go back and look for your app. This way 
the user can by default already scroll down to the app he/she want 
immediately if it is accessible.
Additionally, for most categories you will get about 1-1.5 lines of 
applications. Most users will only have 2-3 categories that are really 
packed (usually the All-In-One categories like accessories and other). 
This means that the filtered look seem a bit too empty.
The only wasted space in this case are the "dead space" at the end of 
each category which shouldn't be too much accumulated. (On average this 
should be about half the amount of categories of rows of applications).
The only use case which I think is hampered by this change is someone 
who needs to find an application based on name but doesn't know the 
category. In that case, though, the search will perform much better.

Window Menu Overlay
==============
Currently the right click menu on the windows is really out of place in 
the shell. In addition there are quite a few window actions which in the 
current form might be hard to do for people who have a hard time using 
the mouse. (Dragging the move between workspaces, dragging to maximize, 
resizing can be hard due to small borders, etc...). I would suggest 
turning the window right click into something which would allow for 
easier actions on windows.
When a user right clicks on the title bar there is a black translucent 
overlay covering the window (similar to activities overview). This 
overlay will have big "grabbers" in the corner allowing for easy 
resizing. Dragging anywhere in the overlay will allow easy moving. In 
addition there will be relatively big buttons under the titlebar (like a 
toolbar) for maximize, close, and other similar actions (stay on top?, 
etc...). On the right side of the window there will be the workspaces 
like they appear in the overview allowing for easy switching between 
workspaces.
It is very important that there will be an easy shortcut to get in and 
out of this overlay (again, so users who have a hard time with a mouse 
will be able to get in easily) and all of the actions in the overlay 
should be accessible by keyboard. (For example, arrow keys will move, 
shift+arrows will resize, alt+arrows will move between workspaces, etc...).

Thanks again for all the hard work on this desktop, much appreciated.
Daniel