unity-design team mailing list archive

[Dylan McCall <dylanmccall@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Nov 12, 2012 at 11:40 AM, balint777@xxxxxxxxx
<balint777@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> I have made a really quick mockup about what i think would solve 2 things i
> dont like about the current implementation of unity.
>
> The blurred dash slows down the overall unity experience. Especially on
> non-intel devices and while runnung dynamically rendered content (video or
> games).
> The close button is in the corner in place of the ubuntu logo right now.
>
> What do you think?
>
> --
> Csonka Bálint

I uploaded your mockup to my people.ubuntu.com, since people might not
want to deal with the attachment:

http://people.ubuntu.com/~dylanmccall/unity/balint777-sliding-desktop-mockup/

I agree with you, this could make more sense than the current
approach. I see the problem that the blurry / transparent effect is
occasionally clunky and resource-draining, sometimes harmful to
readability, and I really haven't encountered a situation using Unity
where it is useful that the dash has a fixed width and height (or a
big border). Using 100% height for the dash would be nice, especially
with the amount of content Unity is able to find these days, and with
your simpler aesthetics I bet it would be easier to use a proportional
_width_ as well. (I would like that, in particular, since it would
make Unity a possibility for users with large text sizes).

It isn't really clear to me what you meant to do with the top bar. A
mockup with indicators, a window close button and the menu bar could
be helpful. Also, have you thought about a situation with the launcher
hiding? Your design right now has the desktop width dependent on the
width of the launcher, so things could get odd if the shape of the
launcher changes.

GNOME Shell 3.6 went in a similar direction with the message tray. I
don't know what their reason was in particular, but the response to it
has been positive:
https://live.gnome.org/GnomeShell/Design/Guidelines/MessageTray/
It was limited in a lot of ways before 3.6, where the message tray had
to exist in this very small transparent thing that appeared on top of
the desktop. With the (larger) space that is entirely the message
tray's, it is a lot nicer to interact with. In general, I think one of
the reasons I find GNOME Shell more polished feeling is because they
are able to have a smooth transition between all the parts of the
shell that I use regularly. The activities overview, the lock screen
and the message tray fit together in a logical way that makes sense.
Even the status menus have pretty well thought out animations. Once
Unity can do that, I will probably find myself using it a lot ;)

Dylan