unity-design team mailing list archive

["gespertino@xxxxxxxxx" <gespertino@xxxxxxxxx>]

> Den 07. okt. 2011 15:12, skrev SorinN:
>> All peoples talk here about small screens - this is the main target of
>> Ubuntu OS ?
>> Normal desktop user ? No one think about ?

+1

2011/10/7 Jo-Erlend Schinstad <joerlend.schinstad@xxxxxxxxx>:
> I run a dual screen setup with a 23" and a 24", both in 1920x1080. I love
> the overlay scrollbars, the global menubar and that menus and window buttons
> are hidden when not useful. I don't think I've seen anyone talking about
> small screens in this thread. I like these features because they don't
> distract my eyes unnecessarily, but it doesn't hurt to minimize the waste of
> space either.

You value that, but others (like me) tend to be willing to sacrifice
some minimalism in order to get features more accessible.
Hidden scrollbars (I have to admit I haven't tried 11.10, so I'm
talking about the ones in 11.04) make things a little bit slower.
With visible scrollbars you know where they are, you just move your
pointer and use them. With hidden scrollbars, you have to aim more,
and sometimes you miss.
Also the invisible area used to call the scroll widget ends up using
the same space a regular scrollbar will use, and that ends up
conflicting with applications that place any widget on the right edge
of the window. An example of that are GIMP 2.6 spinners (I'm aware
that 2.8 will have different that prevent that, but you get my point).

You have a dual large screen setup and you love overlay scrollbars and
global menus, I have a single 22" inch monitor and I found it very
difficult to do my regular work with them.
Who's right?
It's impossible to please all, but we're talking about a change that
affects a lot of users that didn't have any problem with menus and
scrollbars just like they were, and do have problems with the new
ones. And the ability to bring them back to the original state is
missing.

A non issue has fixed created a new issue. I'm all for visual
cleanliness but not if that means sacrificing functionality. And in my
honest opinion, both overlay scrollbars and global menu achieve a neat
visual appearance with a high cost: they take more user attention to
be used when needed, making common procedures slower.