Re: [Usability] Changing the taskbar semantics

[Kalle Vahlman <kalle vahlman gmail com>]

On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 09:55:47 +0200, Maurizio Colucci
<seguso forever tin it> wrote:
> On Wednesday 01 September 2004 06:30, Kalle Vahlman wrote:
> > On Wed, 1 Sep 2004 00:16:58 +0200, Maurizio Colucci
> >
> > <seguso forever tin it> wrote:
> > > Currently the taskbar is a list of (open) windows.
> > >
> > > Idea
> > > ------
> > >
> > > Could the taskbar become a list of (open) application instances?
> >
> > [...]
> >
> > > 1. There is a very good reason. While the taskbar is a good place to
> > > switch between different instances (e.g. two mozilla windows), it is not
> > > a good place to switch between child windows of a single instance (e.g.
> > > gimp windows).
> > >
> > > Why? Because different instances are usually meant to be visible one at a
> > > time, whereas child windows of a single instance are meant to be all
> > > visible at once.
> > >
> > > Take gimp for example: gimp has a single instance with many windows. The
> > > windows are meant to be visible at the same time, so you would never use
> > > the taskbar to switch between them.  You would just click inside them.
> >
> > This is actually not true. When working with Gimp, I often have several
> > image windows open but do not want to have them visible all the time.
> 
> You are right. That's terrible. So we HAVE to rely on application-specific
> hints?
> 
> Wait: what if the taskbar detected that the two gimp windows containing images
> are OVERLAPPING, whereas the palette etc are not? Since they overlap, this
> means they can't be toggled by clicking on them, so they MUST be meant to be
> toggled with the taskbar. So it actually creates TWO taskbar buttons, each of
> which, when clicked, brings on top one image window and all the auxiliary
> windows.

It still leaves the case that you want to bring up *just* the document (image)
window. Like that, you would probably obscure the other document window, which
is not good always (like comparing to another open image while working
with gimp).
 
And that would still be application-specific, no matter which end it
is decided. I can't
think of a clear way (other than wm hints) to decide if a window is a
document window
(overlapping) or not.

-- 
Kalle Vahlman, zuh iki fi