Re: [Usability] nautilus, panel, and metacity not acting as if the desktop was a single entity

[Matthew Thomas <mpt myrealbox com>]

Calum Benson wrote:
>...
> FWIW, I've always thought that the desktop should really just be one big
> two-dimensional panel, with as similar capabilities and interactions to
> the panel as possible. (A direction that we're arguably headed anyway,
> with the increasing popularity of things like Konfabulator, gdesklets
> and Apple's Dashboard.)  Having two objects that share many similar
> behaviours but also have some arbitrarily different ones is a surefire
> way to screw up a user's conceptual model.
>...

That's a bit ironic, since Konfabulator, gdesklets, and the Dashboard
are petri dishes for the development of objects that share many similar
behaviors but also some arbitrarily different ones. (Surprise! The
Dashboard Calculator widget has behavior inconsistent with the
non-Dashboard Calculator app. Surprise! The Dashboard Dictionary widget
has behavior inconsistent with the non-Dashboard Dictionary app.
Surprise! The Konfabulator Clock widget has behavior inconsistent with
the clocks in Windows and OS X. I'm sure I could say the same about
gdesklets too, if I could only get them to run for more than 0.5 seconds
before disappearing...)

> Having said that, I totally agree that we should strongly discourage
> applications to install launchers on the desktop... if we could find a
> way to prevent that whilst still allowing the user to create their own,
> I'd be entirely in favour.  Just because a feature is open to
> annoying-but-harmless abuse shouldn't automatically mean we deprive our
> users of it though, provided they consider the usefulness to outweigh
> the annoyance.
>...

In OS X, I put programs on the Desktop for the same reason I put
documents on the Desktop; as a temporary measure while I try them out
and decide whether I want to file them somewhere or throw them out. In
Gnome that's not an issue, though -- applications either appear in the
Applications menu, or (if badly packaged) disappear beneath the GUI
never to be seen again. Either way, I don't need the Desktop for them.

-- 
Matthew Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/