Re: global (MacOS Style) menubar applet

[Iain <tigermilk btinternet com>]

> 
> Hello,
>   I would like to work on the following item in the UI Improvement
> Project:
> http://developer.gnome.org/gnome-ui/software/gnome-core/#gnome-core1
> 
> I justed wanted to check here first to make sure no one is working on it
> already.

I know people have attempted to work on it, but I don't know how far they got, or where any
of their attempts are.

<semi-rant time>
Personally, I don't see the point of this UI "improvement" at all.

Why do people seem to think it is a good idea? It seems the only real reason is
"Because the Mac had it and the Mac's GUI is the best around". But this has a number of failings
(IMO).

a) It was designed when screens were smaller. I remember using a Mac at the start of the 90s
and the Amiga had it too (although it was hidden until you pushed the right mouse button), 
and from what I the screen resolutions were about 640*256 (or 200 if you used NTSC amiga).
Having more than one application onscreen was not really an option, so because an app was
usually fullscreen, having the menubar at the top of the screen didn't make much difference.

However, today's resolutions are much, much increased, and I currently have 14 windows open on
the screen (1600x1200). To look from the window to the top of the screen is a massive strain on
my eyes, and moving my head too much gives me motion sickness.

b) "Things at the edge of the screen are infinitly large", meaning that in theory I can fire my
cursor up to the top of the screen and it'll be ready for me to click. Great, execpt because my
resolution is large, it's far more effort to move to the top of the screen than to move to the
menu bar. And just pushing and letting go doesn't work, because the mouse only gets halfway
up the screen.

c) It was designed when click to focus was the standard. For me to move from this window 
(evolution-composer) to get to the theoretical menus at the top of the screen, I have to pass
through 4 different windows, and with sloppy focus, each gets the focus, and therefore would
theoretically be "the last one focused".

d) It would only work for GNOME menus. Seeing as menu placement is about the only thing that
all X Toolkits have in common (yes, you can move GNOME's menus around, but come on, who really has?)
then having GNOME applications' menus appear in the panel and all the others at the top of
application windows would be a RILLY RILLY RILLY bad thing.

e) Assumes there is enough room on the panel for all the menus. What happens if there's a 
GNOMEICU, a mail check applet and the menubar has 8 or 9 entries? The only idea I can think of
is putting them into a popup, which hides the data, and which means another click to bring it
up.

So, from what I can gather, this is only really useful if you've got a 640*480 screen,
have click to focus or one application maximised onscreen at once, and only use GNOME apps.
In other words, not a great number of people.

I'm not saying you shouldn't/can't do it, this is more a plea that the UI hitsquad (or
whatever the new one Miguel has set up is) don't just look at the Mac interface and copy
everything that is there, just because "The Mac has it and the Mac has the best interface
EVER". I honestly think that if the Mac UI was being redesigned totally from scratch
(OSX doesn't really count because they still had to appease the old die hard macers) that 
they would have just gone with all other GUIs and put the menus at the top of the windows.
Encapsulation of information (IOW having the menus with the windows they operate on) I think 
is more important that Fitt's Law (or whatever that stupid thing about objects at the edge
of the screen being infinitly large is called).

iain (This being the longest email I have ever composed with Evolution)