unity-design team mailing list archive

[staticd <staticd.growthecommons@xxxxxxxxx>]

design principles, vision and consistency are good things.
Usability and efficiency are essential things.

@Joe: I dont think either Omar or Louiz are refering to quick lists.
what they are speaking of is a menu that pops up *as soon* as one mouses
over the icons, (only If more than one window is open - as pointed out by
callum).

@all:
The proposed change to the launcher (pop up menu) is essential.
The suggested fix for showing titles of *all* windows along with previews
is also very important. previews are cute but a title alone is more useful
than a preview without a tile. (Title+preview>Title alone>preview alone)

Tangent thread:

Task management is broken in ubuntu. The whole focus on
1)removing the distinction between running and launchable apps (why is it
important to confuse them?)
2)app based vs. (window + workspace) based Alt+Tab switcher(very glitzy but
of no practical use above use above ~10 windows IMO)
Is highly disruptive to productivity.

Even this will still be much less efficient than a bottom taskbar due to:
1) the targets are not at a screen edge.( elder users have very poor
coordination in targeting)
2)The targets are close to each other and small in the axis of stacking (
20 pixels) compared to taskbar entries(200 pixels at the screen edge)
3) if we have large targets, we need the menu to stay visible for a while
as the users will have to move the mouse a long way. however this will make
false positives/ accidental shows very much more irritating.

<scream> We need a task bar!</scream>