[Usability] KDE and GNOME ideas.

[<auto496138 hushmail com>]

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Hi,
I don't want to sign myself to a mailinglist so I have send my gnome/kde
feedback to you.

I have got some ideas for the KDE and GNOME desktops that I'd like to
share with you.

When you click on the taskbar, (the taskbar that is pushed out of the
gnome/kde panel to load a program), the taskbar disappears.
But linux is multitasking, so the taskbar shouldn't go away, it should
stay. If you have clicked on a program the taskbar should stay  so you
can click on another program.
If you want to get rid of the taskbar you can do something like the taskbar
will disappear if you click outside of the taskbar or maybe some other
kind of action. You can do something like load a program when you click
on an icon of the taskbar and let the taskbar stay. Let the taskbar disappear
if you click on the textpart of the taskbar.

Apple's new osx has got a nice graphical login program. If you want to
become a different user you don't have to log out first if you are logged
in graphically. If you want to login as a different user you login from
an active running apple graphical enviroment directly.
In apple the the first user stays logged on in background. I think in
some cases the first user should be logged out automatically if you log
on as another user. For example; maybe you should automatically log out
the first user by an option in the login program, if the first user is
root.
An option to let the programs run of your current desktop environment
to the next desktop enviroment when you log in as a new user and maybe
switch some of the programs permissions to the user that is logging on
might also be a nice thing.

A similar thing can be done for KDE and GNOME. Go to another desktop
without logging out or logging in. When you go to another desktop the
current desktop will get to be turned off automatically. Or you let them
run both at the same time and you can switch instantly. Maybe you should
merge the login program with desktop switching program so you don't have
to change from user and switch from desktop separately if you want to.

An option to automatically log in as an ordinary user when booting linux
is something that suse linux distros allready have.

Is it possible to program a rule that makes it impossible to have different
kinds of windows borders at the same time. If  there is a program with
a different border the desktop environment should automatically give
the program the current desktop environment windowborder. Different kinds
of windows borders on one desktop look sloppy.

It might be a good idea to have the possibility to have multiple programs
in one window. Something like terminals or directory windows sideways
or on top of each other, two programs on top and one long program next
to it or whatever looks nice and is practical. Two, three,four or five
different kinds of programs in one window or maybe more depending on
how small the window size of a program could be to maintain a good overlook
 of the program so you can operate it properly. A dozen programs in one
window might be too much.
It might look better when you restore the multiple program window to
a smaller size only to show one kind or two kind of programs depending
on the size the window is restored to. The third or fourth program should
be kept in an underlying layer of the window which of course you can
access with a mouse click.
Multiple programs in a window might save some screenspace because you
don't have to repeat certain windows parts such as the upper windowborder
with the program title and stripe, rectangle, cross buttons.
If you maximize a program through a menu option in a mutiple program
window it would go over the layer of other programs appearance but it
still all happens in one window. If you restore the program it will go
back in the underlying windowframe together with the other programs.

Run multiple programs with one single click on a certain icon and put
the programs in one window ore more windows.

When you are working with a computer you sometimes use a set of programs
to do a certain ?task?. Is it possible to have ?task engines?? This way
the programs that belong to the task you want to do, do not get mixed
up with another task you want to do at the same time or later on.
With one click a window appears with multiple programs in it, as I call
it ?a task?, on the desktop. You can make it so that with one click on
the mouse you load multiple tasks. You can even have multiple tasks in
one window layered on top of each other.

You probably have seen seen website tabs on new internet browsers. Maybe
tabs are a good way to manage tasks. Or you can set more menu options
on the 'file,edit,view' bar.

To have a good overlook on your desktop you should have a option to have
multiple tasklists (I don't know if it is called the same in kde) with
each it's own programs. I am talking about the program that shows what
windows are present on the desktop.
You can only see one or two tasklists at a time on the panel. If you
want a good idea of what is running you should have the option to show
all the tasklists above the panel. Since there probably isn't going to
be enough room on the panel itself. And you can show miniturized windows
of the programs.
If you want to know what particular programs you have open you should
also be able to find that out without showing the rest of the programs.
If you wan to prevent a chaos you can set guidelines on how large you
want to make task engines, tasklists, multiple program windows.

Sometimes I am reading from Netscape fullscreen and I want to try what
I red out in my gnome-terminal on the upper right side. However as soon
as I move the sidebar to read ahead my gnome-terminal disappears. Can
something be done so I can pin up my gnome-terminal to the Netscape window
so it will not disappear. Of course you must also be able to unpin the
windows.
This might be a small thing, but it could be very nice and handy for
a lot of poeple. It will reduce the amount of action in order to do your
work and that would be efficient.

What about icon engines? If  you want to have a diffrent set of icons
on your desktop it should be done with a single mouse click. You can
load different set of icon shemes with the standard icons of trash, cdrom,
 floppy. Or if you want to enjoy your background image you can set an
empty icon scheme with even no standard trash,cdrom,computer,floppy icons.
If you want to do a certain task where you might need a certain program
or set of programs you can load a different icon scheme.

Things like error message should stay in the window or border of the
program that the error message came from, I think this will look tidier.
Different windows or messages without a border of the same program should
be kept into one or maybe two or even three windows, but not more windows
I think. This will create a good overlook on the desktop. Although the
content of the window itself should be well ordened also.

I have an alternative for hourglasses and little clocks that the mousecursor
occasionally changes in to. If your program takes time to load, you can
see this on the panel instead of on the cursor. If a program already
has a window you can make something like a simple little analog watch
in the corner or somewhere else with only stripes that lites on in darker
grey when the program is loaded. Or you can use a percentage bar although
that might not look nice because it will take up a lot space and therefore
look dominating. Windows uses percentage bars and hourglasses. GNOME
or KDE might want to use other indicators of how long it will take to
load a program. Have you thought about showing the amount of bytes that
has to load or show the speed in bytes. Next to the percentage of a program
this might be good and small indicators for computer performance.
Something like ?20% at 4.0Mb/s of 0.6 GB? on the left or right under
corner of the window or the panel if the program doesn't have it's own
window yet.  And you can put the simple analog watch on the beginning
or the end of  the time indicator line if you want to.

Could you make a chastity scanner? You scan for unopened files like pictures,
 or videos with a lot of pink and brown color; the program calculates
the amount of pink and certain proportions, shapes and sizes. This way
you can keep your computer porn free forever.

Search tools only search for names. Search tools can be more powerful
by scanning what type of file a certain file is. You scan the content
of the file like the command, file does.
If you want to know how much and where there are files like pictures
on your computer you can search for pictures without providing a filename.
This way you can check with your search tool what and how much pictures,
 videos and other kinds of stuff are on your computer without knowing
the filenames or extensions of the files.

Xfce desktop environment said GNOME and KDE are too big.
Small programs use less memmory and diskspace and are therefore faster.

Find a better alternative for software dependencies.
Put dependenciecode in a library so diskspace is saved.
The computer will be more stable and faster.
Now if you accidentally delete a program you risk the change of other
programs will fail to run.

auto496138 hushmail com
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