Re: [Ayatana] Exploring alternatives for making the Home Button more obvious

[topdownjimmy <topdownjimmy@xxxxxxxxx>]

My mistake, it appears that a thread regarding alternatives had
already been started:
https://lists.launchpad.net/ayatana/msg06273.html

Apologies for the noise.

On Mon, Aug 15, 2011 at 2:24 PM, topdownjimmy <topdownjimmy@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> It looks like a slight adaptation of Evan Huus' mockup is making its
> way into Oneiric.
> https://lists.launchpad.net/ayatana/msg05586.html
>
> I'm curious, what is the justification behind this change, versus some
> other way of solving the "Dash/Home Button isn't obvious" problem
> (http://design.canonical.com/2011/04/unity-benchmark-usability-april-2011/)?
>  The bug report (http://pad.lv/764771) doesn't seem to have any
> discussion attached to it, and I think Evan's is the only mailing list
> thread that talks about it at any length.
>
> I just feel uncertain that all the alternatives have been explored here:
>
> What if the Home Button were orange?
> What if it were more curved with a stronger gradient to have a more
> button-like appearance?
> What if it glowed when the mouse cursor hovered over it?
> What if its importance were more strongly emphasized in the
> installation slideshow?
> What if the system started with the mouse cursor hovering over the
> Home Button, just as Mac OS X starts with the mouse cursor hovering
> their Apple button?
> What about this other mockup?:
> https://blueprints.launchpad.net/unity-shell/+spec/better-ubuntu-button-bfb
>
> And these are just a few ideas...
>
> I share the concern with some people that moving the Home Button into
> the launcher de-emphasizes its centrality to the Unity Shell, and it
> seems to me that some more subtle changes might accomplish the same
> thing without breaking the expectations of people who have already
> gotten used to Natty.
>
> -Jay
>
> On Fri, Apr 22, 2011 at 6:17 PM, Evan Huus <eapache@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> Hi, I'm new to this list so please let me know if I'm out of turn
>> somehow, but I have a few ideas for future incarnations of Unity.
>>
>> I was reading the Canonical Design blog post at [1], and two
>> particular problems caught my eye:
>>
>> -
>>
>> First, many users seemed to have difficulty finding settings.
>> Currently these are accessed through the Applications lens or through
>> the top-right shutdown menu. Neither of these are particularly
>> intuitive, since users don't consider settings dialogues to be
>> applications (even though they *technically* are). The solution that
>> makes the most sense to me is to add a third lens to the default
>> Applications and Files lenses, a System Settings lens. The icon can be
>> the default magnifying glass with a stylized gear in the middle.
>>
>> I'm not sure the best way of implementing it, but it ought to be
>> fairly simple to have it search only those .desktop files which would
>> appear in the System->Preferences or System->Admin menus in previous
>> incarnations. Another question is whether we leave those .desktop
>> files in the Applications lens or take them out: I'm not sure which
>> would be best. The obvious keyboard shortcut is Super-S, which
>> conflicts with the workspace launcher, that would also have to be
>> dealt with somehow.
>>
>> Still, details aside this seems like an intuitive and obvious solution
>> to the problem.
>>
>> -
>>
>> The second idea I had was for the bfb and launcher, since there are
>> several usability problems the study revealed with it:
>> - mousing over the bfb to reveal the launcher is unintuitive
>> - clicking the bfb to reveal the dash is unintuitive
>> - people mistook the nautilus launcher as something more, since it has
>> a 'home' logo and is the first launcher by default.
>>
>> I think all of these problems can be solved by a single slightly
>> different design.
>>
>> By default, I believe that the bfb should be just another launcher
>> item with a mono ubuntu logo, fixed at the top like the trash is fixed
>> at the bottom. The launcher bar should extend all the way to the top
>> of the screen (where the bfb currently is), cutting the top panel
>> short at the left side. I've done a rough mockup of what this might
>> look like at [2].
>>
>> When the launcher needs to be hidden, the animation should make it
>> roll or fold up into the bfb, which shrinks and transforms into it's
>> current state (part of the panel). This should make it obvious that
>> mousing over the bfb reveals the launcher (via a similar roll-down
>> animation).
>>
>> The fact that the bfb is just another launcher item when the launcher
>> is revealed should make the dash more obviously
>> clickable/discoverable.
>>
>> Changing the bfb like this will also help avoid confusion, since the
>> nautilus launcher will no longer be the top, and 'primary' icon by
>> default.
>>
>> I'm fairly confident that this solution solves the mentioned problems,
>> but it probably has issues of its own. All comments are welcome.
>>
>> -
>>
>> Just my two cents,
>> Evan
>>
>> [1] http://design.canonical.com/2011/04/unity-benchmark-usability-april-2011/
>> [2] http://dl.dropbox.com/u/171647/Unity_New_BFB.png
>>
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>