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

[Josh Hoyt <joshhoyt gmail com>]

On 7/15/05, Phil Bull <philbull gmail com> wrote:
> [...]
> Well, surely there is some way of providing extra space which is easily:
> 
> - managed
> - discovered
> - utilised
> 
> by users, whether power users or novices? There are a lot of ways of
> approaching this I think - stick with the workspace concept and draw
> more attention to the pager, use a big previewing pager (see
> Luminocity), use a screen space which pans when you (for example) hold
> down the middle mouse button, have a pager which grows in size on
> mouse-over (like the OS X dock with icon zooming) etc etc.

Not a usability expert, but it seems to me that if a folder was
extended to be a container for running applications, it could take the
place of workspaces in a conceptually simpler way. A folder's state,
including running applications could be preserved, so users can keep
all task-specific windows and documents in one place. Persistence
would be expected. There are obvious problems, like window placement
and UI for associating a window with a folder, but I think it at least
warrants discussion.

Josh