unity-design team mailing list archive

[staticd <staticd.growthecommons@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, Nov 23, 2011 at 3:57 PM, Matt Richardson <
m.richardson.1990@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Just to cover a few of your points:
>
> On 23/11/11 05:16, Blair Harris wrote:
>
> The Dash Board
>
> ________________________________
>
> The Home Lens
>
> ________________________________
> The home lens on the dash board is almost useless, there is no practical
usability in the eight large buttons due to FireFox, ThunderBird and
Banshee already present in the launcher. My recommendation for an improved
Unity design is for the home lens to be made for modular panels that adds
much more meaning and a modern look to the home screen. These modular
panels are like graphical widgets for example:
>
> FaceBook\Twitter
> Open applications and tabs in FireFox or Chrome
> Time\Calendar
> Weather
> CPU Monitor
> Network Monitor
> Memory Monitor
> Slide-show
> RSS reader
> Computer Information
> System Messages (Updates, Missing Drivers etc)
> Stocks
> Notes
>
> This has been discussed quite a few times with lots of ideas floating
around. I like your idea for making it modular however, as this allows
people to customise it the way they like.

+1
do we put this up  as a suggestion on the bug report for the change to the
home?

>
>
>
> People with programing knowledge should be able to create custom panels
 and share them with everyone via the Ubuntu Software Centre which will
also help get the community involved.
>
>
>
> This, as far as I am aware, is something that is planned for the future
in terms of lenses, but I like the idea of extending it to panels for the
home screen.
>
>
>
>
>
> The Application Lens
> ________________________________
> Lets start by having a look at the current application screen, the screen
is split up into the sections that are:
>
> Frequently used
> Installed
> Apps to download
>
> Each of these section to me are near useless due :
>
> I don’t know about you but the programs in my frequently used sections
are already on the launcher. Every time i go to the application lens is to
open an application that I infrequently use which funny enough are never in
the frequently used section.

The launcher is for frequently used apps.
The recently(but not regularly) used apps section will serve a different
purpose.( there has been talk of filtering out apps already in the launcher
under this section)

> The installed section shows the following items on my machine:
>
> Installed Drivers
> Some card game
> Appearance
> Archive Manager
> Backup
> Banshee
>
> Apart from Banshee these are possibly the worst applications to show
because they are barley ever used. But even if you did show very commonly
used applications then you have the same problem as the most frequently
used section.

The apps are showed in alphabetical order.
Does changing the order to to sort by rating sound like a good Idea to
everyone?

>
> The download sections show nothing useful to download, people either know
which programs they want to install or people including me don’t even know
what this applications are even designed for that have been suggested.
>
> Good points.

Already on is way out

>
>
>
> To find an application that is not on my launcher (which also means not
in the frequently used section) i must perform the following steps:
>
> Open the dash board
> Click the applications lens
> Click the filter results button
> Click the category of the application  (because scrolling through 110
applications is not fun)
> Click the button to expand he installed section (in my experience over
half the time i need to expand)
> Open the application
>
>
> The much quicker way to do this is open the dash, type the first few
letters of the application, hit enter or click the icon.

+1, been proposed already.
Mouse based browsing needs an overhaul. expanding filters and showing the
installed section in full by defauly is an essential change


> A description about the program
> A preview picture of of the program
>
>> I don't think the description or preview picture are necessary here as
if the user wants to know about the application, they could open it.
>> The button to open the program is unnecessary and may confuse new users
who believe that this is how a program is opened.
>> The button to put the application in the launcher is unnecessary as this
can be achieved via drag and drop.
>>The button to update the application is unnecessary as this is covered by
the update manager.
>
>> This leaves us with 3 possible actions to make available: Uninstall,
Change category, Change icon.
>> I think that for this purpose, Uninstall and change icon could be a
right click menu, whilst change category could be achieved via drag and
drop over the category desired.

A "help/ what's this?" item to the right click menu with a description (and
optionally a picture) seems useful to new users.
What does every one think?

> The files screen should just be a light weight file browser including the
following functionality:
>...
>> I like this but I'm not sure how easy it is to implement whilst keeping
it lightweight and fast. I would also add a button to 'Switch to full mode'
which would open the current folder in Nautilus

A "open containing folder" in browser will be useful in the context menu.

>
> Another Lens
>
> ________________________________
> The dash board provides a quick and convenient method for accessing and
viewing program and files. Although as modern systems evolve average users
are required to alter the settings of their computer more than ever. This
why there should be a lens for basic computer settings for the user to
conveniently edit via the dash board. Such settings could be:
>
> Wireless & Networks
> Sound
> Display & Appearance
> Date & Time
> Keyboard
> Language
> Printers
> User Account
> Battery
>
> The design layout should closely follow the applications lens because
consistency is always good. On the left has a list of the grouped settings
as listed above with the centre section containing all the settings a user
may edit.
>
>
>> This has been discussed before and I think the general consensus was
that settings should remain in the 'System Settings' window.
>
> Other Notes
>
> ________________________________
> Other ideas that can enhance the dash board could be:
>
> Search more places such as
>
> The Internet (Wikipedia for example)
>
> These would have to be strictly opt-in to prevent unwanted internet
access. I also think that new lenses are the place for this.
>
> Improved Ubuntu Software Centre searches
>
> I would be interested to hear your ideas on how you would improve this.
For example, I would like to see searching by file extension or a short
description of the program. Again I wonder if the place for this is another
lens, or whether we are in danger of replacing all of our applications with
lenses and should accept that some things are just better done with their
intended application (Ubuntu Software Centre in this case)
>
> Cloud services such as (Ubuntu One, Google Docs, Dropbox for example)
>
> Again these would have to be opt-in but in principle I like the idea of
adding his functionality to the file lens
>
> Mail from ThunderBird
>
> I'm not entirely sure of the use of this. Perhaps you could cite some use
cases?
>
> Bookmarks from FireFox and Chrome
>
> Love this idea!
>
> Notes from TomBoy (or another note taking program)
> Friends from social networking sites
>
> Potentially different lenses for these
>
> The launcher opens in the same state as it was closed
>
> It already does this for me. Not sure why it doesn't for you.
>
> The user can select which screen shows when the launcher opens
>
> That would be nice.
>
>
>
> The Launcher
>
> ________________________________
> The launcher is in a similar situation with the dash board, good idea but
has a couple of design flaws. However the launcher isn't as bad as the dash
board, to be precise there are only two aspects of the launcher that really
need an improvement in my opinion. The first one is when the user hovers
the mouse over the icon a menu should appear to the side with the following
items (just like when you right click on the icon):
>
> Open new instance of the program
> View all instances
> Close all instances
> Remove from the launcher
> Change icon
>
> I don't see the need to change this to being hover instead of right click.
> Open a new instance can be achieved by middle click, but I think a first
time tour could help with the discoverability of this function and I think
that it wouldn't hurt to add it to the quicklist.
> View all instances is currently achieved by double click.
> Close all instances exists in the current quicklist (Quit)
> Remove from launcher can be achieved either by drag and drop to the trash
or by unchecking 'Keep in Launcher' from the quicklist.
> Change icon would be a nice addition but could be added to the current
quicklist.
>
>
> The purpose behind this was that I first found it hard to open multiple
instances of an application. As you know once an application is open
clicking the icon again will only focus back on to that application. To
open a new one I had to do so via the dash board but the point of the
launcher is to quickly open applications. Personally i found this rather
annoying and asking my self what is the point of the launcher if it cant do
its job completely. This improvement will help eliminate any confusion that
users may experience while using Unity to manage their open programs.
>
> The second one is that the launcher is not workspace specific as of
Ubuntu 11.10, for example
>
> I have no programs open at all and then I open FireFox on workspace 1
> I then switch to workspace 2 and click the FireFox icon in the launcher
> What I am expecting is another FireFox window in workspace 2 to open
because workspace 1 should not affect workspace 2. This is the fundamental
purpose of workspaces, that one can have many desktops running without them
conflicting with each other, however when i click the icon on the launcher
I am taking back to workspace 1.
>
> I actually like the ability to switch workspaces by clicking the icon of
the application I want but that's just me. It would be interesting to do a
poll to find out which behaviour people prefer and find more intuitive.
>
>
> This is almost defeating the propose of having multiple workspaces and or
making it harder to manage their application across multiple workspaces.
The Ubuntu community have long loved the feature of multiple workspaces so
the last thing you wont to do is take it away from them.
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Other Notes
>
> ________________________________
> Other ideas that can enhance the launcher could be:
>
> Choosing where the launcher is positioned on the screen
>
> Discussed many times and I think it is planned for the future
>
> Rather than having little arrows indicating how many instances are open
display a number in a little box in the corner
>
> Good idea. Not sure what you would do about programs that currently
display badges for other items (e.g. Thunderbird new emails)
>
> Have the option of dragging some icons onto the desktop instead of
keeping them on the launcher
>
> This can be done from the dash to the desktop
>
> Dragging icons up and down the launcher to rearrange the order of
appearance
>
> You can already do this
>
> Shortcut to files, folders and web-pages etc
>
> Would love to see implemented.
>
> Folders that when clicked show another group of icons
>
> There have been a few ideas around this.
>
> Have an icon to show the desktop
>
>
> Again, this has been suggested a few times. I'm not sure why we don't
have it, though this is available from the alt+tab switcher. Perhaps it
would be better to assign the bottom right hand corner to this function
(particularly useful for windows 7 users) rather than taking up extra space
on the launcher.
>
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Thank you for taking the time for making these suggestions. Not all of them
will be accepted, but don't let that discourage you from saying what you
think.( Despite what some may say ubuntu is not perfect as it is and needs
feedback. ;) )