unity-design team mailing list archive

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

Forgot about removing the display on hover feature of the global menu. It
should without a doubt be set to always visible by default!

2011/5/27 Niklas Rosenqvist <niklas.s.rosenqvist@xxxxxxxxx>

> Hello everybody!
> After I've taken part in a lot of discussions since the release of Ubuntu
> 11.04 I've finally come up with a complete list (for the moment) of features
> and changes which I and hopefully the rest of the Ubuntu community would
> like to see implemented. Since it's a rather extensive list have I grouped
> every topic into sections and accompanied all the features/changes with
> mockups.
>
> I had problems with taking screenshots of the dash and context menus, I
> later found that this was a bug, so I made many of the UI-elements from
> scratch by referencing some Natty Alpha screenshots I found (until I thought
> of taking pictures in a virtual machine). If you need a Unity photoshop
> template you can download the PSD-file here:
>
> http://tests.nsrosenqvist.com/resources/Unity-2.0.psd.zip
>
> -----
>
> *Lenses - Dash*
> *
> *
> As the lenses are currently implemented they are not as effective little
> applications as they were originally planned to be. First of all, the lenses
> inhabiting the launcher are just wasting launcher space. By searching in the
> dash you still get the results from the lenses which are installed by
> default on a Ubuntu 11.04 installation, without needing to go through their
> respective launchers.
>
> When I first heard of lenses I was intrigued but later when I learned that
> every lens would take up valuable launcher space they just felt unnecessary.
> I wouldn't want to explore new lenses if they were going to occupy my
> launcher bar. But I think that by including them into the dash we would more
> effectively handle lenses. There would only be one "lens" - the dash - and
> within it you could specify further which lens you would like to use if you
> aren't happy with the search results. My guess is that most people are using
> the dash to search for files and applications, much like they do with
> programs as Gnome-Do so this would be the default search feature. But as you
> can see in the image provided below you can see how easy it would be to
> search from another lens:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/76Jge.jpg
>
> (Note: The icons used for other services are taken off the internet and I
> haven't looked up the license terms for them)
>
> -----
>
> *Launcher bottom area*
> *
> *
> In the previous mockup you might have noticed that in the bottom of the
> launcher is a bar with the same height as the top panel and the same width
> as the "Ubuntu button" (Sorry for not knowing the correct terminology). I've
> removed the trash/wastebasket from the launcher since it has been noted
> several times in the ayatana discussions that it can just as easily be
> accessed from within Nautilus and isn't important enough to take up a whole
> launcher. Though it's very important that new users to Ubuntu are finding
> familiar elements to their previous OS of choice (e.g. OS X or Win) and both
> provide a clear trash launcher/shortcut. So instead of removing it
> completely I integrated it into the bottom area of the launcher together
> with the most important part of this area...*
> *
>
> I don't know what to call the button farthest down in the left corner since
> it's a multifunction button. As default it triggers the workspace switcher,
> this enables us to remove it from the launcher, and to be fair it wasn't a
> very good place for it to be to begin with. Sure it's on the edge of the
> screen but having it in the bottom corner makes it incredibly easy to access
> (Fitt's Law), very much like the "show desktop"-button in Win7. Now you can
> just through the cursor into the corner and almost always hit it instead of
> having to aim for it on the launcher.
>
> But since there are so many ways of switching windows I figured that it
> should be configurable to trigger the function which the current user
> prefer. By providing a context menu to it together with options to set one
> of the following (are there more alternatives?) as default: Workspace
> Switcher, Spread, Expo mode, "Alt+Tab", and "Show desktop".
>
> -----
>
> *Toggle background lighting as default and window management*
>
> You might also have noticed that the launchers have their background
> lighting set to toggle. In a default Ubuntu 11.04 installation all launchers
> have brightly colored backgrounds, this has been shown confusing for new
> users (source email: "[Ayatana] Fwd: Re: People expect the backlight colours
> on the unity launcher to mean something") since they expect the color to
> mean something. I also like that running applications are shown more clearly
> instead of just the arrow on the left side of the launcher. It's much easier
> to switch between running applications by the launcher with this.
>
> I know that the launcher behaves more like a dock than a task bar but we
> have had bunch of discussions on app-centric vs window-centric and I think
> in everyone of them we've agreed on that we should make users coming from
> both OS X and Win should be somewhat familiar with how it all works. It's
> also incredibly frustrating to work with many open windows of the same
> application and expose or scale doesn't provide any information of what the
> different windows contain if it's either a terminal window or a text
> document.
>
> So I propose that either enable expo mode for the current application on
> double clicking the launcher, but then also provide close and minimize
> buttons and a text box with the window title for both Expo mode and Spread
> mode. Or implementing a Win7 like popup.
>
> The Win7 method has been argued many times since the delay on showing the
> popup heavily cripples the work flow but this could be fixed with a very
> minimal delay so that it doesn't flicker a bunch of popups when scanning the
> launcher quickly but as soon as it slows down the popups will start to show.
> Together with this and on mouse click showing both the popup and latest used
> window it could work. It could be implemented like this:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/9kGkS.jpg
>
> I also made a small but significant change: making the launcher "background
> bubbles" look less prominent. Right now when they aren't running and
> background light is set to toggle it looks like the launcher is inhabited by
> bubbles. That's why I faded the background just a bit, maybe it can be done
> more or be redesigned but it look a little bit better at least. Here is an
> image showing the change, the left half is how it looks normally and the
> right half is it with faded backgrounds:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/g2oMe.jpg
>
> -----
>
> *Launcher overflow*
> *
> *
> Am I correct to assume that the only reason why there needs to be a Unity
> 2D project is that the launcher utilizes 3D effects? In that case I think
> the overflow of launchers could be handled with a glow on the side where the
> launcher overflows. In my mockup you have to imagine that the glow was on
> the bottom earlier but the user scrolled down to the bottom launcher so that
> the overflow is now on top. This is because in the mockup I chose to have it
> on top to be able to show the launcher bottom area without any additional
> distractions. Nuff said:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/SOl9z.jpg
>
> A glow effect like this could provide the same functionality without
> 3D-effects.
>
> There is also a problem with the scrolling of the launchers. If you scroll
> down to select an application the launchers automatically scroll backup
> after selection. If I scroll down it means that I want to work with the
> applications in focus, not the ones which are set to "keep in launcher".
>
> -----
>
> *Ubuntu Welcome Center*
>
> Today when a new user uses the OS for the first time there is no way for
> him/her to know what do next. There is a help program but how is he/she
> supposed to find out about it? When I first started using Ubuntu/Linux I had
> to go online and read tutorials in blog posts. This isn't a professional way
> of handling this problem - leaving it to somebody else. Windows feature a
> welcome center program and even Linux Mint does. So why doesn't Ubuntu? I
> made this mockup earlier for the thread "[ayatana] Ubuntu Welcome Center".
> Imagine it without "install ubunu-restricted-extras" and add a checkbox for
> "show on startup" and maybe add an "Open the browser to go online"-button:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/pQkYj.jpg
>
> The discussion in that thread turned away from the subject and became about
> the Yelp vs Ubuntu Tour project instead. But the main idea is that we should
> give new users a tour of some kind of the OS, much like what the Ubuntu Tour
> people are working on but perhaps integrated into Yelp but providing the
> tour with a much improved UI.
>
> -----
>
> *Global menu*
>
> The global menu is a much discussed topic in the ayatana discussions, some
> can be found in the "global menu in oneric oceleot (11.10)"-thread and the
> "Thoughts on unity design"-thread. I myself want to remove the top panel
> completely since it removes the choice of how to implement a menu from the
> developers. Chromium has a great one button menu and Opera and Firefox as
> well but they cannot benefit from their design choices if they are forced to
> use a global menu. I would much rather see that chromium's tabs took the
> space of the title bar/global menu instead. It also prevents developers to
> design relatively to the top edge of the screen (Fitt's law) since the top
> panel takes away that possibility for them. Please read the earlier
> mentioned discussions to get a complete overview of the pros and cons.
>
> I myself have come to the conclusion that it cannot be removed without a
> complete overhaul of the OS, branching away from GNOME completely. The app
> indicators would have to be replaced because all third party indicators are
> designed for horizontal panels. So therefore the panel probably must stay
> for the time being. But I think that there should at least be a
> configuration option to turn off the global menu.
>
> Some earlier design sketches which maybe can trigger your imagination:
>
> http://i.imgur.com/f8q2c.png
> (clarification: the menu is shown on default and it's state is remembered
> per application)
>
> http://i.imgur.com/biN5v.png
> http://i.imgur.com/wSLus.png
>
> -----
>
> *Other thoughts*
> *
> *
> *Launcher context menu**
> *
> It would be good to have a context menu for the launcher with some logical
> options:*
> *
>
> http://i.imgur.com/HTaS4.jpg
> *
> *
> *Launcher alignment**
> *
> Please enable us to align the launchers to both the right and bottom side
> of the screen. Blogs often have the content on the left side and navigation
> to the right, since we read from left to right we will always be fed
> information from the launcher and never be able to fully focus on the
> content instead. So please make it configurable for those who want to move
> it.
> *
> *
> *Design consistency*
> Quick lists and regular context menus, Dash and Ambiance ... it looks
> completely different. Please aim for better consistency.*
> *
>
> *Ubuntu software center and the repositories*
> As always I have some thoughts about the USC but haven't actually made a
> mockup of my own. Anyways I'd just like to say that it needs a revamp,
> preferably removing the sidebar and integrating it somehow better into
> content view. Or follow this mockup's example:
>
>
> http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2011/05/this-awesome-ubuntu-software-centre-mock-up-would-get-my-custom/
>
> OMG! Ubuntu also brought up PPA's and their use today. They are originally
> meant to work as way for developers to test the applications but this has
> been misused often and serves as an alternative distribution form instead of
> the repositories. This is partly because that no application gets upgraded
> between the Ubuntu release cycles. So if an application like firefox 5 gets
> released in the middle of a release cycle we have to wait to have the most
> up to date software. This isn't how it's supposed to be, the users should
> always have the most up to date software available. So this needs to be
> fixed. Read the following article if you want to learn more:
>
>
> http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2011/05/the-evolution-of-the-personal-package-archive-system/
>
> *A unified Ubuntu design and development platform**
> *
> There are so many ways to discuss ideas and so few to get them implemented.
> There are no good way to submit feature requests except for filing a bug
> report, what's up with that? We have mail discussions, Ubuntu brainstorm,
> Launchpad, and practically no feedback from the developers. We need a place
> where all ideas and bugs can be viewed organized by both designers,
> developers and the community. Not by splitting it all up into a new forum
> but by removing the existing and start from scratch. In practice an in and
> out channel between Canonical, other developers and the rest of the
> community.*
> *
>
> -----
>
> Wow! I Hope I haven't forgotten anything now, this took some time :) Thank
> you very much for reading and I hope we get a good Oneiric Ocelot to look
> forward to!
>