Re: [Usability]Why Desktop Icons?

[Mikael G Claesson <cs131fak ieng9 ucsd edu>]

Hey.

I'm with you 100% on the desktop icon issue. They make no sense, and I
expecially dislike that they occupy the same space that application
windows do. On the Mac it kind of made sense because you had to minimize
your running applications anyway, since each application had its own panel
(the menu bar) (or atleast I think so, I never used them much). And on the
Amiga the Workbench had its own workspace (they called it a screen). But
for a Gnome user to have to minimize or move around a whole bunch of
windows just in order to get at an icon on the desktop background is just
plain bad useability.

One crazy idea I had was a key combination that you could hold down to
make all windows go away temporarily (until you release the keys) so that
you can reach the desktop icons immediately. But yeah, that would be an
ugly hack. Although I'd prefer it to the current situation.

/M