Comments on: 3.0 mockups – Part 1: Desktop organisation

By: Ryan Jefferson

Ryan Jefferson — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 21:56:45 +0000

I have implemented something similar to this called Desktop Drawers. It allows one to have project spaces by selecting between dynamic and static desktops. If you have any suggestions I would be very grateful. Here is the current source page of Drawers: https://launchpad.net/desktopdrawers

By: Easily Distracted » Blog Archive » GNOME 3.0 Ideas (Intelligent Desktop)

Sat, 13 Sep 2008 02:13:08 +0000

[...] of a Summer of Code application I made in 2007, titled “Intelligent Desktop.” Recent discussions have reminded me to at least blog about it. And given my current employment status, I have the [...]

By: goldman

goldman — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 13:54:42 +0000

Really, it’s too soon to be doing radical new mockups. They usually just lead to a desktop full of half-finished features, and we have one of those already. Let’s just go out and talk to real users, watch them use GNOME in their schools, homes and workplaces, and figure out what their problems are. *Then* we start discussing how to fix things.

By: Aigars Mahinovs

Aigars Mahinovs — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 22:26:20 +0000

The Desktop is irrelevant, because 90% of the time users have a bunch of applications open and do not see or use the Desktop. That is Why I LOVE the Places menu – regardless of what windows I have open, I know that I can always get to the folders I need via Places. It is a much better solution than any other on any other system.

Instead of fixing the Desktop (that noone uses anyway) what needs fixing are the panel applets – they take too long to load, use too much RAM and one slow-loading applet can prevent half of the panel from showing up for a minute or more after login.

I would also like to see ‘drawer-like icons linked to real folders, so that pull up a limited file browser just for one folder with a mouse-over, open a document and hide it by moving my mouse away.

By: QUASAR

QUASAR — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 01:55:49 +0000

its better than the actual desktop but i think that complete the desktop that we have right now will be better, let me explain me a bit, roght now we can only order the icons in our desktop by name and keep aligned or not from top left to bottom right, the year is 2008 and we still cant align our icons at the right of our screen like OSX do, or in rows instead of colums, much less order our icons by date, type,etc.

I think that complete the desktop that we have right now justify a lot the upgrade to gnome 2.28, we dont want a 3.0 version like kde has his 4.1 (i mean in new and incomplete things) we are open to new ideas, like the ones of the KDE team have but we need things that work in the way that shoud be working, so if you want to fix the desktop i think that complete what we have right now is the right way to doit, maybe you can later introduce this folderview like feature later.

(sorry for my english and thaks for your work ppl)

By: Phrodo_00

Phrodo_00 — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 18:22:56 +0000

I do like the areas idea, mostly for putting all devices in one area… probably the best would be to have a shorcut/small-translucent-button on the desk that shows the boxes’ borders so you can move them/resize them around, and hide them the rest of the time.
However, I love the menu-style applications|places|system, and will defend it to death, the desktop is usually covered with windows anyway, so once you start something it gets lost unless you have a display over 20″.

By: mao

mao — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 17:47:22 +0000

i support Karl Zollner. adding that PROPER c++ bindings for gkt/glib would be very appreciated in year 2009 i think

By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 17:33:32 +0000

I meant “Try ’scale’ and use the RIGHT mouse-button”

By: Chris

Chris — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 17:32:25 +0000

I like the idea to have a dedicated space on the ‘desktop’ for applicatons and folders. But ‘desktop icons’? Nahhh…

The desktop paradigm is simply SO dead.

The future should be a TILING window manager (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/X_window_manager#Tiling_window_managers).

To have a taste of how much better than today’s GNOME that would be, think of it as Compiz’s scale as the default look for the desktop. Inactive aren’t overlapped by others or represented in a panel, but simply shrunk to a tiny preview.

Try ’scale’ and use the left mouse-button to click on a window; see how it zooms closer. Right-click again and see how it zooms away.

Isn’t this the most beautiful AND useful way of window management? You don’t need a desktop; you just need representations of your running applications, your folders and you applications, tiled in one central screen.

If you want to start an app or open a folder you simply zoom out (scale) to see your ‘desktop’.

In other words, I’d like to see the panels enlarged to cover the whole of the desktop – or the desktop to take over the functions of the panels.

As we have it now, we have an irritating duplication of functions between the panels and the windows/desktop; opened folders appear as windows AND as symbols in the panel. Application icons are virtually everywhere; in the panel, in the menu, on the desktop – brrrr…

By: Aaron Seigo

Aaron Seigo — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 17:29:55 +0000

nice idea; despite what you say (: “Note that I don’t think these are similar to plasmoids, this IS the desktop, nothing on top of it.”) you’ve just described the folderview plasmoid exactly. in fact, your sketch looks a *lot* like some hand drawn ones i have here from 3 years back or so. that’s not a bad thing, i just don’t see the point of going out of your way to say “this isn’t like plasma at all!” *shrug*

for those talking about “can’t see the desktop”, that’s why one eventually arrives at the idea of a “pull to front” dashboard. as for panels being the strategic point, that’s why one eventually arrives at the idea that have a separation of component models between panel and desktop is not smart. and finally, allowing people to ‘clean up’ their desktop should obviously be possible and easy; expecting everyone to agree with you on that matter is a fool’s errand however.

@Kar Zollner: things like the previewer already exist in plasma (in fact, the plasmoid is called Previewer and works just as you suggest =) … so i’d assume that if this avenue of thought is seriously explored in GNOME that something similar being made is practically an inevitability.

in fact, i see you even linked to one of my recent blog entries there. it’s really a non-trivial amount of work to get this all going, and i wish we could work all work on it together instead of starting from scratch. *shrug*

@jeff: frontbringer is interesting; we’ve been working on timelining for a while and i hope to actually have some end user visible results for kde 4.3 at the latest. the approach we’re taking (an actual timeline widget + nepomuk) means it can be used from any app and on any data, not just files in a special folder. drop me a line if you”re interesting in comparing notes on these concepts further…

@ethana2: i completely agree =) well, except the “never have a folder on your desktop, ever” bit; there are situations where having a listing of *relevant to the context* files can be rather handy =) not quite the same as having a folder on the desktop, in today’s common usage though, i know ..