Re: [Usability] GNOME3: Handling/Opening Documents (Website for Contributing Ideas?)

[Diego Moya <turingt gmail com>]

On 20/04/05, Matthew Thomas <mpt myrealbox com> wrote:
> Samuel Abels wrote:
> >...
> > Currently, most of the GNOME applications feel like, well, applications.
> > I thought about why, for example, a word processor does not feel like
> > what I believe it in essence should: A sheet of paper.
> > How could it be fixed?
> >...
> >    - When the application is loaded, the document zooms to real size and
> >      the toolbar is attached. There is no real window border and the
> >      controls are kept to a minimum. Basically, the application IS the
> >      paper.
> 
> Yes, that would make it possible to get rid of the "window" terminology
> altogether. There would be documents, and dialogs, and alerts (alas),
> and control panels, and toolboxes, and progress indicators, but ... no
> windows. (You could make all sorts of fun slogans about Gnome 3.0 being
> An End To Windows.)
> 

To me that sounds a lot like a Zooming User Interface (see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zooming_User_Interface ).

Instead of having a small, limited "desktop" you have a (potentially)
infinite "information plane" in which you hyperlink your way to the
desired information. The concept of Icons also disappears, and a
"thumbnail" is just a document that doesn´t have the focus (but can
have any screen size).

Note that "container" objects like folders, "smart queries" (a la
Beagle) and "Piles" are still possible, so Nautilus doesn´t need to
die to have a ZUI.

One of the most usability-centered ZUI projects is Archy (see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archy ).

A main advantage over windowing interfaces is the "Leap" concept of
having all user content reachable with a simple text search. The other
is having a unified command system (similar to Mac OS X services, but
with a better input interface).