unity-design team mailing list archive

[Vishnoo <vish@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sat, 2010-08-07 at 14:46 +0100, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:
> >
> >...
> >> What sense does it make to have a menu that's labelled "Calculator"
> >> when doing a calculation, "Banshee" when you're playing music, and
> >> "Empathy" when you're chatting with friends -- but "Firefox" when
> >> you're writing e-mail, "Firefox" when you're buying books, "Firefox"
> >> when you're reading the news, "Firefox" when you're playing Farmville,
> >> "Firefox" when you're posting on a Web forum, and "Firefox" when
> >> you're watching Hulu? Not much sense at all.

True , and so did mccann mention using generic names instead of app
names:
<http://blogs.gnome.org/mccann/2009/08/08/whatchamacallit/>

Was this forgotten in the recent shell designs?
Or just an oversight while doing mockups?

As mentioned earlier the window titles are used and not just named
"Firefox" always.

> 
> > than looking for clues such as a super-tiny icon
> 
> In Ubuntu 9.10 and later, the application icon does not appear in the
> window title bar, partly for the same reason (it's not relevant to user
> goals).
> 

You seem to be contradicting yourself. ;)
<https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=557469#c1>
"A menu item should have an icon only 
if it represents a dynamic object such as an application, file, device, or
user, or if it makes the items in that menu segment very much more
recognizable"

If an application icon in a menu makes it more recognizable ,
 how is it not relevant to the user goals?

There needs to be a consistent presentation within an OS , everywhere .
If the application icon is not relevant,then there is no point in 
showing it in the menu either. 

> If you have a document open in Microsoft Word and a spreadsheet open in
> Microsoft Excel, and you choose "Quit" from Excel's application menu on
> the Mac (or "Exit" from its Office button on Windows), the spreadsheet
> will close. But if you had the same document open in OpenOffice.org
> Writer, and the same spreadsheet open in OpenOffice.org Calc, and you
> chose "Quit" from OpenOffice.org's app menu in Gnome Shell, the
> spreadsheet would close, and -- surprise! -- the document would close too.

You are /not/ completely right here.
We do have Close and Exit in OO.o . We can close one spreadsheet and
have the other document open too.
Btw, Why is this an argument against the app-menu? Shouldnt we just find
a way to expose right option here?

Now again , why isnt the app-menu ideal? because of a few bugs or
improper names in the app-menu? 
What is it that makes it completely nonsensical to use such an app-menu?

> These are examples of what I meant by giving historical context for a
> design:
> <http://design.canonical.com/2010/04/notification-area/>
> <http://design.canonical.com/2010/05/menu-bar/>
> 

Such documentations are indeed needed for shell and appmenu too. Anyone
subscribed to the shell mailing list would realize the constant
opposition/rants regarding the design decisions that have been made so
far. 


-- 
Cheers,
Vish