unity-design team mailing list archive

[Joern Konopka <cldx3000@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi  everybody,

first off, let me just clarify what Dylan said for Frederik:

"Are you saying that e.g. Firefox should have a seperate, different sidebar
for each tab that is open? Please apply your theory to how Firefox should
rather handle tabs in your vision.."

I don't mean to steal Dylan's explanation and please correct me if i
explained anything wrong since i of course want to understand better
myself;)

All he meant was that if an Application utilizes a GTKNotebook Widget for
Tabs that could as well be interpreted as top-level Windows, those
Applications should utilize a new type of Widget to expose the toplevel
treatment of the Tabs to the system to distinguish it from Applications that
use the GTKNotebook Widget for content that cannot stand on its own two
feet, for example the Icons Tab in the Appearance Settings. The look and
feel of the Tabs should remain the same, the true advantages are laid out on
the Backend and will make it easier to adopt special treatments for Tabs
where those are demanded.



While we're at the Subject, may i propose the Name GTKTablevel for that
Widget ? xD

Now to my actual reason i'm writing here, you may hate it, you may love it,
maybe somebody already posted something alike, however i have read a lot
into Tabs lately, be it the way Gnome-Shell handles AltTab with grouped
windows or the Mozilla Labs Project from `09 concerning Tabs in the Browser
http://design-challenge.mozillalabs.com/summer09/index_old.html.

It made me think about how Tabs only got invented so people won`t overfill
their Taskbar and didn't have to run 10 instances of a Browser at once.
Still, a Website remains a Toplevel Document and it should be emphasized as
such. Now ever since Dylan mentioned a GTKWidget that separates such Tabs
from Content-specific Tabs it just struck me, why can't i select a Tab from
AltTab if its in no way related to any other Document i have open. And since
i really didn't have anything better to do and im really not the guy with
words i made a Mockup for your enjoyment. Any feedback is much appreciated.

Oh, before i forget, Windicators are taken into consideration as well.

Thanks for being patient and see the Attachment :)

Best Regards, Joern


2010/5/17 Frederik Nnaji <frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx>

> Hi Dylan
>
> On Mon, May 17, 2010 at 17:21, Dylan McCall <dylanmccall@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, May 17, 2010 at 7:05 AM, Tyler Brainerd <tylerbrainerd@xxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote:
>> > Haha. I guess what I'm getting at is theres plenty of apps (like
>> Empathy)
>> > that have tabs available, but they work on different rules. Not to
>> mention
>> > that some apps are on top, others on bottom, some are full featured
>> tabs,
>> > some are content only and not tool bars and so have
>> > inconsistent appearance....
>>
>> There is also some variety in what tabs feel like; what they mean, and
>> how they relate to windows. Lots of apps (Empathy, Firefox, gedit)
>> have tabs representing toplevel windows, to the extent they can be
>> dragged / dropped to expand into new toplevel windows.
>>
>> Reinteract is a neat alternative case. The application lets you do
>> math with Python and you get results in-line (plotting graphs, etc).
>> It has Notebooks, which contain Worksheets. Each notebook is
>> represented by a new window, and all the worksheets in a notebook
>> appear as separate tabs in its window. It makes no mention of tabs in
>> the surrounding chrome (there isn't a Tabs menu), and it is impossible
>> to drag a tab to create a new window. This isn't a problem of any sort
>> because they are a distinctly defined part of the user interface; they
>> represent something in a concrete way and they don't conflict with top
>> level windows. The tabs are just there.
>>
>> I think I have seen a few other apps like this, but Reinteract is the
>> one I remember. I think it is a nice example of tabs done right,
>> because it doesn't feel like they're just throwing tabs in for the
>> sake of it.
>>
>> Not that ”tabs are like windows, but inside of them” is inherently
>> tabs done wrong, but it _is_ a kludgey design as it is, and
>> inconsistent with how tabs are used elsewhere. Right now both designs,
>> even though they are completely different, go through the GTK Notebook
>> widget. Maybe that could be reconsidered. A new widget that
>> semantically and visually represents a separate document inside a
>> toplevel window may be worth exploring.
>>
>> I think becoming consistent with tabs will be difficult when we have
>> some applications (like Firefox) that treat tabs as features by
>> themselves that the user needs to think about directly; and other
>> applications (Reinteract, most configuration dialogs :/) where a tab -
>> as in, that exact same GTK widget - represents a section, or some
>> other unique and tactile thing where the important part is what it
>> represents, not the tab itself.
>>
>
> Being much of a layman, i can still follow most of what you formulate in
> here.
> This time i don't understand your point, for all the words you use to make
> it..
>
> Dedicated GTK widget vs misused "Notes" widget sounds plausible to me,
> thanks.
>
> What's with tabs now? I see the discussion on how tabs can't be
> consistently cycled with [CTRL]+[TAB] in all apps.. But what do you mean
> exactly with your Reinteract example?
> Are you saying that e.g. Firefox should have a seperate, different sidebar
> for each tab that is open? Please apply your theory to how Firefox should
> rather handle tabs in your vision..
>
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Attachment: AltTabMaverick.png
Description: PNG image