Re: Nautilus desktop icons and metacity

[Steve Homer <stephen homer1 ntlworld com>]

I'd have to say that I feel that the icons being on the left feels more
natural and hence usable (at least to me) because

(a) every previous desktop i've used has done it that way.
(b) i'm right handed and moving the mouse away from my body feels less
"deliberate" some how.
(c) i'm a westerner and read left to right, so my eyes are naturally
drawn to the left.

(a) is a questionable usability argument. Basically tradition vs
innovation, or previous knowledge vs intrinsic logic. So we can strike
that I guess.

(b) is right hander centric... but so is the world so I imagine left
handers are very much used to thinking from a right hand persons point
of view (much more than a right hander thinking from a left handers
anyway).

(c) I guess is the biggie. Perhaps default configuration of layout
should be an localisation issue...

While I agree that the icons should be unobstructed wherever possible, I
think that shifting them to the right would be confusing and
counterproductive. In any case, the simplest approach other than
shifting icons around would be to change metacity to open windows on the
right hand side, or to avoid desktop icons when possible.

On Sun, 2003-06-01 at 04:03, D. D. Brierton wrote:
> I'm rather loathe to bring this up, as I suspect it has been argued and
> flamed over before (although I could find nothing on it in the recent
> archives), but I really felt I had to say something about this. I
> honestly believe that given the current GNOME default setup, nautilus'
> desktop icons should be on the right of the screen, and not the left.
> 
> Why? Because metacity's default behaviour is to put the first window
> opened in the top-left hand corner. Given that nautilus places its
> desktop icons in the top left corner, running vertically from top to
> bottom, this means that even opening a single window will likely obscure
> most of one's desktop icons, thereby rendering the desktop useless
> without minimising many of the open applications.
> 
> This is my desktop with no windows open:
> 
> http://www.brierton.plus.com/Screenshot1.png
> 
> Now, as soon as I open just a terminal this is what I get:
> 
> http://www.brierton.plus.com/Screenshot2.png
> 
> Note that most of my desktop icons are now inaccessible.
> 
> Once I have opened many applications, all of my desktop icons are
> inaccessible, even though (on my 1600x1200 display) the right hand side
> of the screen is perfectly visible:
> 
> http://www.brierton.plus.com/Screenshot3.png
> 
> Given the above, it seems to me that there is a clear usability argument
> for having nautilus draw its desktop icons along the right hand side. I
> have no religious issues about this: I don't care what side of the
> screen the desktop icons appear as long as I can access them. If
> metacity can't be persuaded to avoid covering desktop icons whenever
> possible then there is a clear usability case for either doing away with
> the desktop altogether or having the default location of desktop icons
> be on the right hand side.
> 
> Best, Darren
> 
> -- 
> =====================================================================
> D. D. Brierton            darren dzr-web com          www.dzr-web.com
>        Trying is the first step towards failure (Homer Simpson)
> =====================================================================