Re: [Ayatana] Idea for improving visibility of running applications

[Ed Lin <edlin280@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, May 4, 2011 at 6:39 PM, Niklas Rosenqvist
<niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> I think it would be a shame to desaturate the applications which aren't
> running at all times. If you have the launcher set to always visible and
> only one application running then it would look dark and boring, don't you
> think?

Not only the looks, I think desaturated icons don't look exactly
inviting to a new user. They more look like either hidden or even
crashed applications, not like launchers. I'm repeating myself, but
this problem isn't actually solved by making that view hover only.
Just the first part (the looks) is made a bit less glaring.

> And as I said in my previous post, I can't really see the use in
> showing which applications are hidden. It has never been deemed necessary,
> not in   Windows and in Gnome 2.x it's only shown with a pair of "[ ]"
> around the application name, and I've honestly really thought about that
> 'til now .

That's because neither OS had a concept of hidden applications. It
doesn't even exist in Unity yet. But it exits in OS X and the
transparent hidden icons for the Dock is a frequently used option
there. Just google "defaults write com.apple.Dock showhidden -bool
YES" and check how many results you get.


> That is why I'm still convinced that my original idea is the best
> proposed solution so far. As Ed Lin pointed out it might be a problem in
> getting the launcher to react on hover, but wouldn't it benefit the UX (User
> Experience) greatly? Isn't it worth it?

But please tell me one reason why increasing the visibility of the
background of running apps isn't just as good in terms of visibility
with the added benefit of being always visible, not just on hover,
i.e. more consistent and more usable.

> Some didn't like that the icons greyed out completely and I understand that
> and that's why I proposed a configuration option for that. If we just take a
> look on how it would look like if it wasn't completely greyed out and only
> partially desaturated the idea might feel more approachable. That's why I
> created a new version of my previous mockup:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/3bajD.png

Much better, but this still leaves above 2 questions.

> Please just give it some reconsideration out of the UX-perspective. If this
> was an option then I feel that this would be enough to provide a start for a
> descent window centric workflow without removing the app-centric workflow
> out of the design.

The problem of visible running apps has nothing to do with app-centric workflow.
Again, your indicator is for running "applications", not running "windows"!

I've just sent a mail to the list
"What are the advantages of an application-centric interface?"

It's gotten a tad bit long (sorry about that) but my main conclusion
was that the discussion app-centric vs. window-centric isn't all that
worthwhile and doesn't really help us improving Unity at this point.

> And I don't really see a problem in adding the
> configuration options since people will want to be able to configure the
> launcher anyway, we can't take that out of the picture. Some want the
> launcher to be visible at all times and some want it to hide automatically.

Additional "optional options" are a nice thing to have but the
priority is to first get the defaults right as good as we can.

> I do understand that in practice we may find flaws with this design so I was
> thinking of maybe making a JavaScript and HTML mockup in the browser.
> What are your thoughts?

This is a great idea, I'm no good with JS so I can't help on that.

> 2011/5/4 Niklas Rosenqvist <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx>
>>
>> Is it really necessary to indicate which windows are hidden? I mean if you
>> cannot see it you can assume that it's hidden or somewhere else. Even if it
>> is hidden, it can still be accessed with alt+tab or super+("S" is it? I'm
>> not on a Ubuntu machine at the moment) so there is a minimal practical
>> difference between a window being hidden or not. I'm using Windows 7 for
>> games and Adobe Creative Suite and what I can see they don't show which
>> applications are hidden.
>>
>> 2011/5/4 Ed Lin <edlin280@xxxxxxxxx>
>>>
>>> Version 0.3:
>>> http://i.imgur.com/O7cfm.png
>>> Sorry...
>>>
>>> On Wed, May 4, 2011 at 3:23 PM, Ed Lin <edlin280@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>> > On Wed, May 4, 2011 at 11:47 AM, Niklas Rosenqvist
>>> > <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>> >> Can't we continue the discussion here since we are already arguing
>>> >> here?
>>> >
>>> > I think we should split it then, change the subject to something like
>>> > improving Unity for window-centric workflow (was: Idea for improving
>>> > visibility of running applications)
>>> >
>>> >> So what exactly is the mockup showing? Is the wider background box
>>> >> showing
>>> >> the currently focused application and FF and TB are hidden? Please
>>> >> provide
>>> >> us with further explaining of what is what in the mockup since the
>>> >> left
>>> >> launcher is already a configurable option in CCSM. One thing I noted
>>> >> immediately is the lack of the subtle background boxes in the right
>>> >> launcher. I don't think that is a good idea since those boxes gives
>>> >> uniformity to the launcher between the different states when a squared
>>> >> icon
>>> >> set isn't used. I don't think it would work well with the default icon
>>> >> set.
>>> >
>>> > FF/TB and banshee show two different possible solution for running
>>> > applications: a light thin highlight around the icons or a larger
>>> > rectangle background. I didn't show any mockup for hidden apps. The
>>> > background boxes are more a matter of taste, it works well without
>>> > them for those square icons but it could work for all I think (look at
>>> > the Windows and OS X "docks"). But I'm open to that, though at least
>>> > I'd get rid of the highlights at the top and bottom and make them more
>>> > bland to increase the difference between highlighted running and
>>> > non-highlighted not running apps.
>>> >
>>> > Here's a new mockup that hopefully answers your points:
>>> > http://i.imgur.com/L55Yk.png
>>> > In case of Design B all background boxes would need to have the same
>>> > size as the color background.
>>> >
>>>
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>
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