unity-design team mailing list archive

[Niklas Rosenqvist <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx>]

I have to admit that this isn't completely thought through, not much at all
actually, it's more an initiative to spark creativity.

I believe that what really sets the Gnome/Unity desktop apart from OS X and
Windows is the panel applications you can have. They are really effective
and provide a lot of functionality through a minimal interface and the
notification area in Windows can't really be used in the same way. So if the
idea to remove the top panel completely will work then we need to find a way
to handle these applications. My first mockup is a rough sketch on how the
bottom of the launcher could be used more efficiently.

In the mockup I have removed the lenses and workspace switcher from the
launcer since I also has been talking about gathering all lenses in a single
lens application which is reached through the dash. This way the launcher
won't be filled with not so regularly used lenses and leave space for your
favourite applications.

The workspace switcher is instead in the bottom left to easily be invoked by
moving the cursor down in the corner where you won't really have to think of
where your cursor is at since a corner is really easy to hit (much like the
"show desktop" button for Win 7). The idea is also that the workspace
switcher button should have a context menu where you can choose what the
button should do since people are using different ways of switching
windows/applications. This means that you can choose the "workspace
switcher", "expose" (or is it exposé?), "scale", "alt+tab" or "show
desktop". For extra polish can this button also change icon accordingly.

Next to it is the session menu and above is the time and date. The empty
button above the date doesn't have any function in my design yet but I was
thinking of letting it show all "panel apps" but I don't really know how to
do that gracefully, since there are many applications you want to reach
often, such as the sound and messaging menu.

(And as I really liked Ed Lin's idea about a context menu to the launcher
you can also visualize that if you like ;)

Here is the mockup:
http://i.imgur.com/sl8k6.png

If this won't work then maybe we could just move the whole top panel to the
bottom of the screen and have a "intellihide" function for it or merge it
with the launcher:
http://i.imgur.com/pgmOw.png

With the whole "app area" of the top panel gone then maybe we could also
move the maximize, minimize and close buttons to the right end of the
titlebar so that the title bar can merge gracefully with the menu when the
window is maximized. But I guess this is a question of preference when you
are left or right handed. Someone said earlier in the discussion (don't
remember if it was in this thread or in another) that it's easier to move
the cursor between the top right corner or the bottom left (when you're
right handed) since you only need to move the wrist and not the whole arm in
such a movement.

Please note that this is just ideas I'm throwing out so that we can discuss
a proper solution.

2011/5/21 Niklas Rosenqvist <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx>

> I read the "A better Linux Desktop" article and the author proposed
> removing the launcher, this is what I think is the strength of Unity.
> Although it was an interesting read.
>
> I have actually been thinking of how you could merge the top panel elements
> into the launcher elegantly and I will create a mockup of how this could be
> done in the near future :)
>
> 2011/5/20 Ed Lin <edlin280@xxxxxxxxx>
>
>> On Fri, May 20, 2011 at 12:35 PM, Niklas Rosenqvist
>> <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> > Ed Lin proposed several solutions to the global menu "problem" in the
>> > ayatana thread "Thoughts on Unity design". But one thing that people
>> tend to
>> > forget when talking about removing the global menu an/or the top panel.
>> > If we remove the top panel where would we put the app indicators? Since
>> they
>> > are supposed to behave like nifty, easy accessible, little applications
>> they
>> > completely loose their functionality if they should be hidden. If this
>> could
>> > be solved with a good solution then there would really be nothing that
>> > prevents removing the top panel. Maybe by having a bottom-panel which
>> > reveals when the cursor is at the bottom of the screen?
>>
>> Hi!
>> Here's a link to said email:
>> https://lists.launchpad.net/ayatana/msg05848.html
>>
>> This might be of interest:
>> http://pastehtml.com/view/1e1uiox.html#mozTocId309447
>> about top vs bottom bar and an idea how to make the info area always
>> visible without having it take up any space.
>>
>> This design doesn't have a sidebar/launcher. I'd really favor putting
>> the clock and whatever indicators need to be visible all the time into
>> the sidebar. As mentioned this would mean that the autohide of the
>> launcher needs to be disabled by default. Not really a trade-off given
>> the wide-screen nature of netbooks and tablets. In fact I'd argue for
>> disabling autohide by default regardless of whether the top panel is
>> going to be removed or not. For new users it the launcher would be
>> more discoverable, less confusing, for everyone it would be faster to
>> access.
>>
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>
>