unity-design team mailing list archive

[Matthew Paul Thomas <mpt@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

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Thamawij Pirajnaraporn wrote on 13/01/11 21:40:
>...
> I have seen the 10.10 netbook and 11.04 Alpha, Unity dock is a big
> improvement but I think global menu is not a good idea with the
> following reasons. (At first I though it was a modified gnome panel)
>
>     * Panel-based OS certainly not work for touch OS because :
>           o panels take precious horizontal space of a widescreen and
>             it's not match for vertical either. A small panel at the
>             edge of screen is really hard to touch it precisely and
>             increasing the size is just wasting screen space.

Ubuntu's multi-touch framework allows for occasional touch gestures, and
provides one of the ingredients for a touch OS. But Ubuntu is not a
touch OS.

If anyone did make a good touch OS based on Ubuntu, it would
not have a small panel at the edge of the screen (or at least, not one
with multiple target areas), for the reasons you give.

>             Especially for netbooks with 1024x600 screen resolution.

Netbooks are not touch devices either. Some netbooks may have touch
screens, but expecting people to use a vertical touch screen for any
substantial period would be disregarding how human arms work.

>           o This will just follow the Microsoft Windows 7 mistake, it
>             sucks on netbook with touchscreen. I have tried both Unity
>             and Windows 7 on Lenovo S10-3 and I barely use touch screen
>             because it's so annoying when you miss a touch. What will
>             happen if small Close/Minimize/Maximize buttons went on the
>             top edge ?

Any sensible touch-based OS would not have Close buttons, Minimize
buttons, or Maximize buttons. That has nothing to do with where the menu
bar is in a pointer-based OS.

>     * Implementing global would be worthy if it had been done a few
>       years ago but doing it now is out-of-date since touchscreen is
>       coming. If the aim is to persuade the users from Mac with the
>       similar interface with a plus of a Unity dock then this is a big
>       mistake (I just guess for the reason, may be I'm wrong), in
>       contrast Ubuntu users that affordable for a Mac would go for it.
>       Ubuntu would be compared as a second class product that following
>       around the successors.
>...

We're using a unified menu bar in Ubuntu not "to persuade the users from
the Mac with the similar interface", but because we think it's the best
way of presenting menus in a pointer-based interface.

A pointer-based interface takes advantage of screen-edge targets (like
the menu bar), compact controls (like menus), and tooltips (as in the
Unity launcher).

A touch-based interface takes advantage of flicking (like for
scrolling), and complex drags (like twisting to rotate an object).

They are very different things, and a design that works well for one
will hardly ever work well for the other.

Cheers
- -- 
mpt
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