Re: [Usability] Can the GNOME desktop survive an encounter with my parents?

[Elijah Newren <newren gmail com>]

On 8/26/05, Vidar Braut Haarr <vhaarr+usability gmail com> wrote:
> On 8/26/05, Elijah Newren <newren gmail com> wrote:

> > > 18. Having all his applications on one desktop, he now starts to drag
> > > the windows to the Workspace Switcher to drop them on other desktops.
> >
> > Which is filed as http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=143857.
> > http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=96675 is somewhat similar
> > (drag window buttons from window list to the workspace switcher).
> > These and some other related bugs are being tracked in
> > http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=155908.  Additionally, maybe
> > in the right-click or alt-space window menu we could show the
> > keybindings for moving windows to other workspaces?
> 
> I do not think exposing these keybindings would solve any problems.
> The only reason he used them were because I told him about them when I
> noted his failure to drag a window to another desktop. I do not think
> he has ever used the alt-space menu before, or indeed knew it existed.

I said "additionally" not "or".  I agree that I don't think it would
have solved your father's original problem.  In fact, this was a
tangent from your email (how to make things easy to use for
beginners/newbies.)  But, since he tried right-clicking and
middle-clicking various things anyway and was interested in things
that worked efficiently, it's likely that he would eventually discover
that window menu (it's also accessible via one of the buttons on the
titlebar, after all, usually opposite from the minimize, maximize and
close buttons).  And when he discovered it, if we had the keybindings
shown in the menu as they are for minimize, maximize, close, move, and
resize, it would help him learn how to interact with his system
faster.

Yeah, that's a bit of a tangent for this thread.  But I was just
thinking about how we were missing the keybindings for those actions
in the menu when the others aren't missing.  *shrug*

Hope that helps,
Elijah