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Re: super+n+up/down/home to rearrange launcher icons.

 

I like the idea, but wouldn't it mean coding a delay before Unity actually launches the program? Otherwise, how will it know whether you want to launch or just move the icon?

I've been thinking of something similar for a while; my idea was to have launchers that opened more than one program at a time, in effect a kind of session launcher, but the way they worked became more complicated the more I thought about it. Your post made me think of something (slightly) less complicated:

Somewhere in the code, Unity stores what's on the launcher bar, right? Well, how about it stores multiple config files, so there are you can have multiple arrangements of launchers that you can switch between? That way, you could have terminal, geany, bazaar-explorer etc., in the different orders you want, and instead of moving them about, you just switch to the launcher bar that has them in the order you want at the point you need them. The way I imagine it, it would be as if the launcher bar has pages.

The advantages are clear to me: you have all the GTD goodness of focus (you could have only the tools you need for a particular task, without the temptations of a firefox launcher) plus each bar wouldn't be over-laden with every launcher the user thinks they'll ever need.

The main problem I can see is that it'll take more than just multiple config files to make it work; each bar has to display each program that is open, for example, and how do you switch between the different bars? A keyboard shortcut is the obvious answer, but what about the mouse? Page dots (under the Dash button?) is the first thing that comes to mind, but they'll be small targets for the mouse to hit, and Unity isn't about small targets.


On 27/09/11 14:06, Jo-Erlend Schinstad wrote:
I rearrange launcher entries fairly often as I change contexts. For instance, when I'm programming, the terminal is 3, geany is 4, bazaar-explorer is 5, etc. When I'm playing the guitar, then Audacity is 3, Tuxguitar is 4, etc. This makes it very easy for me to switch between apps using one hand and I really love it.

However, it just dawned on me that I always use the mouse to rearrange those entries. That should not be necessary. I should be able to press super+3downdowndown to move the third entry down to the sixth place, super+5upup to move 5 to 3, and so forth.

I should also be able to press super+7+del to remove the seventh entry from the launcher. Similar, I should be able to press super+5+home to keep the fifth entry on the launcher.

It would also be nice if I could use super+4rightarrow to expose its quicklist and then use up and down to navigate that menu.

What do you think?

Jo-Erlend Schinstad

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