unity-design team mailing list archive

[GianZap <zappete@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hello everybody.
I have watched the nice video [1] on the planned multi-monitor support for
Unity 5.x. I think it is *wonderful*, and would love to use it with my two
monitors.
Still, I have a small concern and a brief proposal :)

If I understand it correctly, the planned behavior as shown at UDS-P is:
1) each monitor has its own independent workspaces,
2) you can move windows between monitors, AND you can move them between the
workspaces of the same monitor.

My concern is that as one adds monitors, the number of workspaces grows and
one could easily get lost. It also requires a bit of abstraction and
mnemonics as you need to remember that "Firefox was on workspace 3 of
monitor 5".
Moreover, I feel that it would be a nice addition to provide a "physical"
way to put the *same* workspace on two monitors, so that they display the
same image (i.e. output cloning). Currently one has to setup output cloning
in the display preferences.

So I would like to propose an alternative arrangement:

1') there is only one set of workspaces, as many as you want
2') you can choose to put _any_ workspace on _any_ monitor you want,
regardless of ordering.

e.g.: a set of 5 workspaces (A, B, C, D, E) and four monitors.
monitor 1 has ws B
monitor 2 has ws E
monitor 3 has ws B (again!! --> cloning)
monitor 4 has ws A

You'd use Expo on a monitor to select which workspace you want to put on
that monitor. This way output cloning would be set up just by using Expo
and selecting the same workspace on two monitors.
Moreover, you wouldn't need to remember on which monitor *and* workspace
sits the Firefox window. As soon as you call Expo on the current monitor,
you have a complete overview of every workspace _and_ monitor. I feel this
would be simpler and more intuitive, but of course I may be wrong. And I am
aware that it is a bit different than the planned behavior. I just wanted
to share my thoughts and I'll trust the designers' judgement :)

Thanks for your attention, and for the wonderful work on Unity!
Best,
-- 
Gian

[1]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=lbwNMnNUGFA