Re: [Ayatana] Places > People

[Thorsten Wilms]

On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 02:25 +0200, Frederik Nnaji wrote:

> 2. In which of the above categories would you prefer to see
> "Contacts".. Personal or rather Network? or perhaps a new "People"
> category?

Network is for your local (computer) network and thus no place for
Contacts/People.

Not all contacts/people a user wants or has to manage are what they
would call "personal".


People and Contacts are not quite the same. The first implies or
encourages bundling of as much information as you you can get, while the
later puts an emphasis on addresses and communication channels.


> 3. What do you know about the concept of "Places" and how happy are
> you with the current implementation of it?

I think the Desktop folder has great potential to confuse users with its
special dual presence.

The whole dual approach of having a single-rooted filesystem and
"Places" on top of it presents a scary conceptual depth.


> David suggested we discuss specifically the integration of
> metacontacts in Unity's launcher, so please ppl, let it happen ;)

_meta_contacts? I'd prefer to call it people/profiles if it's about
bundling addresses belonging to a single person. Hmm, there's also the
question of how to model organizations, where you might have addresses
that do not map to persons.
Call it Groups if it's about collecting addresses in a mailing list or
newsletter style.


-- 
Thorsten Wilms

thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/


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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between panel applets

[Martin Owens]

On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 07:45 +0100, Mark Shuttleworth wrote:
> If you are running only Ayatana indicators, then yes you will be able
> to have a "menu only" experience end-to-end. For 10.10 that will mean
> using connection manager, which will still have rough edges, and the
> clock indicator, which is relatively simplistic. But it will still
> feel tighter and more unified than a hodge-podge of panel applets, so
> that's how I'll be using it :-)

So long as it has 24 hour clock, seconds and an ability to display a
basically a custom datetime format of my choosing through some non-ui
configuration.

I really like iso date/time.

Although I hear it'll unravel all the functionality for the evolution
calendar and task list as well as the handy locations and ability to
change locations from that menu.

Is that true?

Martin,


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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between panel applets

[Mark Shuttleworth]

On 28/06/10 08:33, Martin Owens wrote:
> Although I hear it'll unravel all the functionality for the evolution
> calendar and task list as well as the handy locations and ability to
> change locations from that menu.

In due course, similar capabilities will be added. But for the moment
it's minimalist.



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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between panel applets

[Conscious User]

> In due course, similar capabilities will be added. But for the moment
> it's minimalist.

Here's me hoping that those similar capabilities will be implemented
in a neat d-bus service way which follows an app-independent protocol,
thus closing one of the most common complaints against the current
clock, which is being too tied to Evolution.



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Re: [Ayatana] Places > People

[Jan-Christoph Borchardt]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 9:05 AM, Thorsten Wilms  wrote:
> On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 02:25 +0200, Frederik Nnaji wrote:
>
>> 2. In which of the above categories would you prefer to see
>> "Contacts".. Personal or rather Network? or perhaps a new "People"
>> category?
>
> Network is for your local (computer) network and thus no place for
> Contacts/People.
>
> Not all contacts/people a user wants or has to manage are what they
> would call "personal".
>
>
> People and Contacts are not quite the same. The first implies or
> encourages bundling of as much information as you you can get, while the
> later puts an emphasis on addresses and communication channels.
>

Helpful further reading specifically on that:
http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/designing-for-social
(Designing for Social Interaction – Strong, Weak, and Temporary Ties)


>> 3. What do you know about the concept of "Places" and how happy are
>> you with the current implementation of it?
>
> I think the Desktop folder has great potential to confuse users with its
> special dual presence.
>
> The whole dual approach of having a single-rooted filesystem and
> "Places" on top of it presents a scary conceptual depth.
>

This reminds me that I always wonder why not just the desktop space is
used for file management. Basically, marry the file manager (or
better: file browser) with the desktop background. Integrate some of
the file managers’ back and forward or breadcrumb controls. Ubuntu and
Mac OS already shows mounted drives but that’s just a half-assed
implementation.

I have to think this through more. Sorry for derailing the thread a bit. ;)

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Re: [Ayatana] Design discussion proposals for Christmas

[Mark Shuttleworth]

On 31/12/09 17:20, Conscious User wrote:
> But *can* the current specification fix this for closed-source apps
> like Skype? The reason I ask (and forgive me if I'm wrong) is that
> Application Indicators seem to solve the problem of notification area
> consistency but not the problem of notification area abuse. Even if
> Skype were to follow the libappindicator API to the letter, it could
> still *force* an indicator icon to appear, and this is something that
> displeases a lot of users.

In the case of Skype, there is now a library that we can use to
integrate it into the desktop more effectively.

Mark



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Re: [Ayatana] File transfer dialog behaviour

[Matthew Paul Thomas]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

David Hamm wrote on 25/06/10 17:32:
> 
> "I don't see how CSD would improve that situation at all"
> 
> From what I've read csd would be more elegant at both a programing level
> and design level, with less resources and the ability to design
> applications for what they are, rather then having the witch of the west
> hang over all apps. The long standing annoyance of getting the app to
> blend with metacity would also be self correcting. 
> 
> Of course the minor annoyance at hand could be solved by a number of
> things but why tell the scarecrow he's and idiot when you can travel to
> Emerald city and save us all.

Sorry, I still have no idea how that relates to progress windows.

The progress window when unmounting a device, for example, correctly has
no close button. It doesn't need CSD to achieve that.

- -- 
Matthew Paul Thomas
http://mpt.net.nz/
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Re: [Ayatana] Broadcasting from Me Menu: thoughts after some time using it

[Mark Shuttleworth]

On 01/06/10 15:36, Conscious User wrote:
> After some time actually using the Me Menu in Lucid, though, one
> thing is bothering me with respect to the specification itself:
> the lack of any kind of feedback in case the broadcasting went
> well. The specification states that notification bubble should
> be only sent if some error has occurred.
>
> I thought it would be just a matter of getting used to it, but
> after a long time that didn't happen: I just *had* to open
> Gwibber after posting something in order to make sure it was
> there and have peace of mind.
>
> Can someone shed a light on the *exact* reasoning behind the
> *total* absence of feedback? I'd suggest sending a notification
> bubble if the broadcasting was successful as well.
>
> That said, however, he Me Menu is already very convenient now,
> thanks to polishing such as automatically focusing the text
> bar, allowing me to just click on the indicator and start
> typing. With a little more polish, it can be quite awesome
> in this age of constant microblogging.
>   

We can (and should) provide a spinny in the indicator icon itself during
the transmit phase, and use a green or red flash (like the one you get
during ajaxy updates in Launchpad) to indicate success or failure.

Mark



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[Ayatana] How Mozilla does community-driven open source design

[David Siegel]

See http://tinyurl.com/2ebzvww for an article on Mozilla's community-driven
design efforts. An interesting caveat from the article:

Some commentators doubt that an open source approach can be fruitfully
applied to design. "There are plenty of good ideas, but they don't work well
together with the real world," says Jakob Nielsen, principal at the Nielsen
Norman Group in Fremont, Calif. Open source encourages the addition of new
solutions and ideas. In design, says Nielsen, "the brilliant idea can be the
one unifying idea that can take away 10 other ideas."

Can anyone cite an example of a "unifying idea that can take away 10 other
ideas" from the Ayatana list, or are we generating "plenty of good ideas
[that] don't work well together"? What can we learn from Mozilla's efforts
in this arena?

Mozilla's communiy-design epicenter: http://mozillalabs.com/conceptseries/

David
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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between panel applets

[Mark Shuttleworth]

On 28/06/10 08:53, Conscious User wrote:
>   
>> In due course, similar capabilities will be added. But for the moment
>> it's minimalist.
>> 
> Here's me hoping that those similar capabilities will be implemented
> in a neat d-bus service way which follows an app-independent protocol,
> thus closing one of the most common complaints against the current
> clock, which is being too tied to Evolution.
>   

Agreed!



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Re: [Ayatana] Fullscreen Mode for all applications

[Kristoffer Lundén]

2010/6/28 Tyler Brainerd 
>
>
>
>> Yes for consistency, but I'm not sure how needed this is. I for one would
> never have a need to have transmission or nautilus fullscreen, or the
> contact list. These would all be better off with a fixed width and getting
> maximized vertically.
>
>
For most apps, you wouldn't press F11 then. :)

Perhaps applications could set hints that they want to do something else,
for those that are really unsuitable for real fullscreen, but may have an
alternative that makes sense, like the contact list?

/ K
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Re: [Ayatana] How Mozilla does community-driven open source design

[Thorsten Wilms]

On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 11:13 +0100, David Siegel wrote:

> Can anyone cite an example of a "unifying idea that can take away 10
> other ideas" from the Ayatana list, or are we generating "plenty of
> good ideas [that] don't work well together"?

I understand that quote to likely refer to a situation, where you see
ideas for solving several problems that are actually symptoms of a
deeper issue. So one good idea leading to a solution of the deeper issue
renders them obsolete.

That's why it's a good idea to start with (in no particular order):
 * Are you targeting the right problem?
 * Can the problem be avoided / worked-around?
 * Is it perhaps a symptom of an underlying issue?

Hmm, I have a hard time thinking of examples. I blame it on the hot
weather here. All my ideas there revolve around being lazy possible ...
I mean: as lazy as possible :}


If you are worried about a hodge-podge of ideas not working well
together, documented goals and assumptions should help.


> What can we learn from Mozilla's efforts in this arena?

Doing design challenges could be worth it.
http://design-challenge.mozillalabs.com/


-- 
Thorsten Wilms

thorwil's design for free software:
http://thorwil.wordpress.com/


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Re: [Ayatana] Fullscreen Mode for all applications

[Siegfried Gevatter]

FYI, If I remember correctly, GNOME's keybinding app lets you choose a
keyboard combination to switch any window to fullscreen (even if it
doesn't nativelly support it).

-- 
Siegfried-Angel Gevatter Pujals (RainCT)
Free Software Developer   363DEAE3

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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between evolution

[Martin Owens]

On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 11:15 +0100, Mark Shuttleworth wrote:
> > Here's me hoping that those similar capabilities will be implemented
> > in a neat d-bus service way which follows an app-independent
> protocol,
> > thus closing one of the most common complaints against the current
> > clock, which is being too tied to Evolution.
> >   
> 
> Agreed! 

Although one of my main complaints is that evolution is too tightly tied
to evolution. With it's proprietary databases and arbitrary directories.
A little bit of standards compliance would go a long way.

Martin,


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Re: [Ayatana] File transfer dialog behaviour

[Frederik Nnaji]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 11:55, Matthew Paul Thomas wrote:

Sorry, I still have no idea how that relates to progress windows.
>
> The progress window when unmounting a device, for example, correctly has
> no close button. It doesn't need CSD to achieve that.
>

you're right, CSD is not needed for progress, but it catalizes it.
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Re: [Ayatana] Broadcasting from Me Menu: thoughts after some time using it

[Frederik Nnaji]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 12:08, Mark Shuttleworth  wrote:

> On 01/06/10 15:36, Conscious User wrote:
> > After some time actually using the Me Menu in Lucid, though, one
> > thing is bothering me with respect to the specification itself:
> > the lack of any kind of feedback in case the broadcasting went
> > well. The specification states that notification bubble should
> > be only sent if some error has occurred.
> >
> > I thought it would be just a matter of getting used to it, but
> > after a long time that didn't happen: I just *had* to open
> > Gwibber after posting something in order to make sure it was
> > there and have peace of mind.
> >
> > Can someone shed a light on the *exact* reasoning behind the
> > *total* absence of feedback? I'd suggest sending a notification
> > bubble if the broadcasting was successful as well.
> >
> > That said, however, he Me Menu is already very convenient now,
> > thanks to polishing such as automatically focusing the text
> > bar, allowing me to just click on the indicator and start
> > typing. With a little more polish, it can be quite awesome
> > in this age of constant microblogging.
> >
>
> We can (and should) provide a spinny in the indicator icon itself during
> the transmit phase, and use a green or red flash (like the one you get
> during ajaxy updates in Launchpad) to indicate success or failure.
>

That would be great.
Still i miss the custom status for IM alongside the MeMenu's presence
settings.. where is it? Available, Away, Busy, even Invisible are there, but
no custom text status.. i like the idea of easy access to microblogging
whether i have my clothes on when i come out of the shower or not, but i'd
prefer to put the blogging use case where blogging is handled, and not so
ambiguously close to IM presence settings.
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Re: [Ayatana] Fullscreen Mode for all applications

[Frederik Nnaji]

Hi Siegfried,

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 13:39, Siegfried Gevatter  wrote:

> FYI, If I remember correctly, GNOME's keybinding app lets you choose a
> keyboard combination to switch any window to fullscreen (even if it
> doesn't nativelly support it).
>

yeah, Compiz can do that to a window.

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 04:09, Frederik Nnaji wrote:
>
> Fortunately, Compiz has "window rules" which can allow for toggling of
> fullscreen mode for any app.
> Unfortunately, this feature is buggy, as gnome-panel will sometimes cover a
> fullscreen app, instead of disappearing behind it or autohiding.
>

i think a fullscreen mode is different from the ordinary window mode.
The worst example for how to design a fullscreen mode was what i found in
the current Epiphany release. Epiphany rocks, really, i love it, even if it
has some rough corners. But i have a mouse way of getting into fullscreen,
and NO mouse way of leaving it. That's a problem.

What is fullscreen?
Fullscreen is a way of using all the screen pixels to focus mainly the
content an application is trying to communicate to a user.
Every application should decide by itself, what content is relevant while in
this special mode of window focus. Some apps might even request FUSA/MeMenu
to set itself to busy automatically, which definitely should be optional if
implemented as a feature.
Back to Epiphany, while in fullscreen mode, it still shows a navigation bar
and doesn't autohide the tabs toolbar.. this totally misses the point of
fullscreen mode.
In fullscreen mode, an app should display content only, perhaps a few
controls where appropriate, no redundancy at all concerning window chrome or
anything decoration-wise..

or what is the meaning of fullscreen in your opinion?
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Re: [Ayatana] How Mozilla does community-driven open source design

[Frederik Nnaji]

Hi Thorwil,

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 13:25, Thorsten Wilms  wrote:

> On Mon, 2010-06-28 at 11:13 +0100, David Siegel wrote:
>
> > Can anyone cite an example of a "unifying idea that can take away 10
> > other ideas" from the Ayatana list, or are we generating "plenty of
> > good ideas [that] don't work well together"?
>

The worst case is that 10 ideas go to waste for one.
The best case is that 1 idea unites 10 ideas and gives them true purpose for
the first time.
In military we learn: ready yourself for the worst case, aim to achieve the
best case results.


> I understand that quote to likely refer to a situation, where you see
> ideas for solving several problems that are actually symptoms of a
> deeper issue. So one good idea leading to a solution of the deeper issue
> renders them obsolete.
>

This is called a higher level solution.


> That's why it's a good idea to start with (in no particular order):
>  * Are you targeting the right problem?
>  * Can the problem be avoided / worked-around?
>  * Is it perhaps a symptom of an underlying issue?
>

"underlying" or higher level mean the same thing here, so i agree again ;)


> Hmm, I have a hard time thinking of examples. I blame it on the hot
> weather here. All my ideas there revolve around being lazy possible ...
> I mean: as lazy as possible :}
>

bein lazy is the true secret, my math teacher always told me.
We want equations to be simple, as simple as possible, so that there is no
redundancy in the formula. A large term containing redundant expressions
should be reduced to its formal essence.
The best example for this is Google, who learn asymptotic analysis in MIT's
algorithms class, then go on to make billions with that knowledge.
Theta notation and similar methods all base on being sloppy, lazy and
allowing for a greater fault tolerance, in order to see a bigger picture
more clearly.

remember: to see a bigger picture, you need to lean back and relax your iris
:D

 > What can we learn from Mozilla's efforts in this arena?

>
> Doing design challenges could be worth it.
> http://design-challenge.mozillalabs.com/
>

good idea!
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Re: [Ayatana] Lack of harmony between panel applets

[Frederik Nnaji]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 12:15, Mark Shuttleworth  wrote:

> On 28/06/10 08:53, Conscious User wrote:
> >
> >> In due course, similar capabilities will be added. But for the moment
> >> it's minimalist.
> >>
> > Here's me hoping that those similar capabilities will be implemented
> > in a neat d-bus service way which follows an app-independent protocol,
> > thus closing one of the most common complaints against the current
> > clock, which is being too tied to Evolution.
> >
>
> Agreed!
>

+1

now that someone said "Evolution", let me suggest something to make the
indicators more harmonious ;)

Messaging Menu and MeMenu are struggling not to duplicate each other's work,
both are looking to develop their respective individual identities.

I suggest, give them identities:
MeMenu stays responsible for Me-related stuff such as account settings that
are tied to it, and it should handle instantly relevant stuff such as VoIP
phone calls, Instant Chat Messaging and Presence.
Messaging Menu does all that has to do with non-instant messaging, such as
broadcast, email and News. Especially the broadcast field from the MeMenu
rather belongs to the Messaging Menu, if you ask me.

This way we would keep a clear line between the two menus, i would
intuitively find what i'm looking for, since i know that one topic/category
is covered in one menu, another topic/category is covered in the other menu.
All i need to remember now is the indicator applet icon that stands for
non-instant messaging, and the other one that stands for what would
encompass the instant stuff..
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Re: [Ayatana] Start Menu Concept

[Frederik Nnaji]

On Wed, Jun 23, 2010 at 07:07, David Hamm  wrote:

> People are great at pattern recognition, hence icons > text... ios, hunting
> & gathering etc.
>

wow, David!
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Re: [Ayatana] Unity Screenshot

[David Siegel]

Of course that discussion is not off topic! Please, share your thoughts.

David

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 1:37 PM, Frederik Nnaji wrote:

> We all love what's coming, so here a screenshot of how things could look
> once this train is up and running nicely.
> Thanks to the entire team @ canonical!!! This is going to be an incredible
> UI experience ;)
>
> i hope this is not off topic..
>
> Is discussion of Unity's current state and possible features based on the
> current testing experience OT for this ML?
>
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[Ayatana] Condensed menuitems

[Cody Russell]

Jorge Castro just pinged me and showed me the following:

http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/06/google-chrome-tests-unified-menu.html

Kind of interesting, and I thought I'd post it to the list (if it hasn't
already been posted) and see what our design-minded community thinks of
these types of condensed menuitems.  They strike me as potentially
interesting since we're always looking for ways to save vertical space on
UNE.

The obvious issue is that accelerator/shortcut labels are not displayed for
these items.  Another potential issue is that it could affect the feel of
left/right keying between menus.  This is not really an issue so much for
Chrome since they only have one menu here.

/ Cody
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Re: [Ayatana] Condensed menuitems

[Dylan McCall]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 11:19 AM, Cody Russell  wrote:
> Jorge Castro just pinged me and showed me the following:
> http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/06/google-chrome-tests-unified-menu.html
> Kind of interesting, and I thought I'd post it to the list (if it hasn't
> already been posted) and see what our design-minded community thinks of
> these types of condensed menuitems.  They strike me as potentially
> interesting since we're always looking for ways to save vertical space on
> UNE.
> The obvious issue is that accelerator/shortcut labels are not displayed for
> these items.  Another potential issue is that it could affect the feel of
> left/right keying between menus.  This is not really an issue so much for
> Chrome since they only have one menu here.
> / Cody

That unified menu has a “Tools” submenu. As a result, I am not a fan.
“Tools” is meaningless, especially given that the menu itself is a
picture of a tool. The computer is a tool. Copy & Paste are tools. The
keyboard is a tool. A boat anchor is a tool.
Submenus are evil, too, and that is one thing the Chrome menu often
does a great job not having. Every time you add a layer of
categorization, you are hiding something and forcing somebody to slow
down. If the things in that category have so little to do with each
other that “Tools” is the best possible adjective, They Don't Belong
In A Category!

Having commented grumpily about that new design, Chrome as it is
provides a wonderful example of the value of condensed menus. Their
two menus on the top right are considerably more meaningful, and
better categorized, than the 5ish menus we have in most Gnome apps.

In addition, Chrome's menus aren't attached to a 100% wide horizontal
bar that takes up the rest of their space, so there is no further
incentive to expand them “because there's room, so it may as well be
used.”
Because the menu works so well, Chrome doesn't need another 100% wide
bar with big icons below it. The menu already does the job properly.

How did they do it? Simple!

They didn't give in to “tradition.” They didn't think “we'd better
have a File menu and stick Quit and Options under there because
everyone else does.” Instead, they designed the menu layout that makes
the most sense for their specific application. They created their own
narrow categories that perfectly group the functionality specific to a
web browser. Clever, indeed.

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Re: [Ayatana] Condensed menuitems

[Jan-Christoph Borchardt]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 8:19 PM, Cody Russell  wrote:
> Jorge Castro just pinged me and showed me the following:
> http://googlesystem.blogspot.com/2010/06/google-chrome-tests-unified-menu.html
> Kind of interesting, and I thought I'd post it to the list (if it hasn't
> already been posted) and see what our design-minded community thinks of
> these types of condensed menuitems.  They strike me as potentially
> interesting since we're always looking for ways to save vertical space on
> UNE.
> The obvious issue is that accelerator/shortcut labels are not displayed for
> these items.

Obviously, but when you think of it:
If you use the menu for copying and pasting, you are clearly _not_ a
keyboard shortcut person. And everyone else knows the combinations
anyway.

Sure, the learning effect is destroyed. But how much is it worth to
have a cluttery shortcut hint displayed that you are going to ignore
anyway when you can have an awesome bundled function pair?



We don’t really need a way to access the menu faster (as in global
menu), we need a way to access the _items_ faster. Chromium and Mac OS
help search serve as great examples.

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Re: [Ayatana] Broadcasting from Me Menu: thoughts after some time using it

[Apoorva Sharma]

Hi.

 On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 12:08, Mark Shuttleworth  wrote:

> We can (and should) provide a spinny in the indicator icon itself during
> the transmit phase, and use a green or red flash (like the one you get
> during ajaxy updates in Launchpad) to indicate success or failure.


I really like the idea of having some sort of notification on a successful
broadcast from the memenu. However, I think that too much color could be a
problem. Thus, I propose the following:

   - After the user stops writing the message, a spinner fades in at the
   right end of the textbox.
   - If the message is successfully sent, the spinner fades out, a check
   fades in, and after a while, the check fades out.
   - If the message fails to be sent, then a red cross fades in in place of
   the spinner, and doesn't fade out until the message is sent.
   - If it fails at first, but then works, the red x fades out, and the
   check fades in.

I think that this system would provide a minimalistic notification of the
broadcast, fitting in with the minimalistic style of the panel.
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Re: [Ayatana] Broadcasting from Me Menu: thoughts after some time using it

[DavidTHamm]

Is twitter, facebook etc not the same as a chat room or im'ing? Do their  
website interfaces not appear similar to a chat box? Why are they being  
treated different then chatting with someone? Sure status is global, but  
shouldn't twitter etc. just appear as contacts in your list? This way you  
don't have any of the problems listed here, plus you have a history of what  
you've said as well as others, just like when you use the website, or a  
chat box.


http://haacked.com/archive/2007/06/02/twitter-solves-the-chat-usability-problem.aspx

If you look at these services in this light, the only difference between  
them and a chat box is the nice backgrounds(? :D).


Personally I'm much more curious about how the chat box could look similar  
to facebook etc. Because thats the best part about the services,..reading  
what other people have to say.
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Re: [Ayatana] Symbolic Folders - Icons for a better experience

[Walter Wittel]

On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 6:52 AM, Frederik Nnaji
 wrote:
> here's 2 mockups of how a properly organized filesystem can look.
...
> anybody?
>

I think this could be quite nice in a narrow domain (for instance
provide a view of well known document types under ~/Documents).
However I see several problems completely replacing the hierarchical
view throughout the UI. The hierarchal view should always remain an
option as long as the underlying file system is hierarchical.

For example I would like to copy some related files of different types
to a USB drive to be consumed on another system. How is this
accomplished? Jumping between icons. And how are those relationships
discovered (mp3 and album art)?

Where are files displayed w then the type can not be easily determined
or doesn't fit the available icons? Are all files all parsed to figure
out where they should be displayed? This is costly (but of course an
index could be maintained).

I think a "filter everything under directory xyz" Nautilus view such
as you illustrate would be great (but where would it start - perhaps
it could only be for Documents). Also this view as a standard "file
open" dialog used by apps would simplify things for end users and help
bridge the way to an eventual non-hierarchal file system.

However I don't agree that the hierarchal nature of current file
systems should be totally hidden from users (or force them to terminal
to do file management). Initially this should be a flat / symbolic
view hosted in applications (and maybe a startup shell showing only a
subset of home), and the user should be able to switch to a hierarchal
view for browsing external media (or just if they want to). We're
talking MVC here and this would be a great supplemental view in the
file system "model".

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Re: [Ayatana] Songbird's creative use of client-side decorations

[Scott Kitterman]

On Monday, June 28, 2010 10:35:29 pm Ryan Prior wrote:
> I just tried out Songbird's latest nightly build for Ubuntu
> (http://wiki.songbirdnest.com/Developer/Articles/Builds/Nightly_Builds)
> The UI is very slick, and one vertical-space-saving trick they've
> implemented in a visually appealing way is to put the full menu bar in
> the window decoration.
> There's been lots of discussion about Chrome's use of CSD -- I think
> Songbird does a nice job with it, too, but it would be even better if
> it could respect the host platform's rules about which side the
> buttons should be on, etc.
> 
> Screenshot attached.

I think that makes two of two implementations that nicely illustrate the 
concern that CSD is harmful for workspace consistency.

On that note, it'd nice if gtk would follow the host workspace's rules for 
cancel/close arrangement.

Scott K

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Re: [Ayatana] Broadcasting from Me Menu: thoughts after some time using it

[David Hamm]

had to throw this out there before it slipped my mind, but one of the
disadvantages to the design I proposed was that it takes a few to many
clicks to tweet. Which is of course quite a problem considering the target
audience and the typical urgency of the situation. However one of the
beauties of having the contact list in the corner is it allows you to take
advantage of the screen edge.

Taking into consideration that an auto opened large contact list would be a
problem, and that the cursor typically moves inward as you go down a list,
one could simply trace from the corner down the edge of the screen to open
the contacts (list). Further, having the the contact list sorted by
favorites would make the Tweet contact not far off from the top as well as a
swift one click open. Followed by a "omg I just tried the bannana burger on
In-n-outs secret menu!, it was amzing!!1!"
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Re: [Ayatana] Songbird's creative use of client-side decorations

[Conscious User]

> I think that makes two of two implementations that nicely illustrate the 
> concern that CSD is harmful for workspace consistency.

I have to agree on this one. Visual inconsistency is one of the oldest
complaints against Songbird.



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