unity-design team mailing list archive

[James Jenner <james.g.jenner@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 3 November 2011 14:06, Elias K Gardner <zorkerz@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> When you have to interact close to the left edge of a window the launcher
> can be accidentally activated blocking interaction on that part of the open
> window.
>
> The launcher can be made not to popout when the cursor hits the screen
> side by installing CompizConfig Settings Manager and changing the Unity
> plugin's reveal mode on the behavior tab to "none".
>
> I think this is one setting that should be somewhere in the system
> settings out of the box. It is maddening to have to move your cursor out to
> close the launcher then carefully back.
>
> Another alternative would be to have a button that when pressed
> keeps/closes the launcher (just thinking out loud her not sure its a good
> idea, seams to duplicate the super key dash functionality a little).
>
>
An alternative would be to have a visual interactive control on the
launcher that changes it's state of popout and to not popout. A pin is the
obvious analogy though in reality some form of marker (eg. a small circle
or an arrow or similar) would do the trick, as in to be consistent with the
styling of Unity. Obviously a keyboard shortcut would apply as well.

With such an option when the launcher is hidden, the control to stop it
from popping out would need to be visible, so some thought would be needed
as to where this control sits, how it appears and how a user interacts with
it (both via keyboard and the mouse).

I personally think such an option (to stop it popping out automatically)
isn't such a bad idea.Maybe instead of a "don't popout" control, it could
be a "hide launcher" control.

Just some thoughts. For me personally it hasn't been a problem and I have
no need for such functionality, but then I have a very large screen and
very rarely work full screen within an application. However I can see how
this could be required for certain types of environments and work patterns.

Cheers,
James.