Re: [Usability] Grouping Windows: Sticky Windows

[Nadyne Mielke <nmielke acm org>]

At 09:03 PM 4/5/2004, Ryan McDougall wrote:

[snip]

> While one might be annoyed by windows that are stuck together against
> your will, it doesn't get too far in the way of usability.

I'm not sure about that.  Let's assume that I have one main task window 
open (email client) and a handful of peripheral task windows open (media 
player, instant messenging client, a couple of IM windows, network monitor, 
system monitor, file browser).  (These are the windows that I currently 
have open and visible on my workspace.)  Sometimes I need to move my main 
task window (say, to access the desktop icons that are directly behind the 
main task window).  I could minimise the window, but sometimes I simply 
shift it a bit so that the icon I need is visible.  If I move my main task 
window towards the various other open windows, they'd all stick together.

There's the sheer annoyance of having to unstick several windows because I 
moved one big window.   But worse, I'll have lost my organization of the 
peripheral windows.  I tend to keep each of those windows in a specific 
location.  I would lose a lot of time either unsticking them (unless there 
was an 'unstick all' optin?) and moving them back to where I usually keep 
them, or in trying to figure out where they are in the new layout.

I suppose that one way around that problem would be to have a way to 
specify in a particular window that I never want to have other windows 
stick to it.  A more general case would be to say that I don't want any 
more windows to stick to this particular grouping (where the group is n 
windows, n>=1).  That allows me to say that I want only my network monitor 
and system monitor to stick together, but if I move one of my IM windows 
down near them, it won't stick there.  This suggestion might add a lot of 
conceptual overhead, though.

[snip]

> -GUI desktops generate a lot of windows, and manipulating each as
> separate entities divorced from any relationship with any other window
> requires the constant mental overhead of know which window relates to
> which, and the constant manual manipulation (moving, resizing, etc.) on
> their own. The GIMP is one example, as is the common developer's setup:
> editor, terminal, debugger, music player, etc. If we have *some* means
> of tying these windows together we can improve usability by decreasing
> the distinct and separate entities that a user has to track and
> manipulate.

The overridding issue here is that the user has to manually manipulate 
windows (sometimes repeatedly in the course of a single task) to achieve 
the highest degree of usability at a system-wide level.  Users have limited 
screen real estate and a lot of windows vying for both screen placement and 
user attention.  Further, optional placement on the screen in terms of 
screen real estate used (that is, few overlapping windows and few unused 
bits of the desktop) is not necessarily optimal placement on the screen in 
terms of user attention.

Assuming that I've stated the issue correctly, I'm not entirely certain 
that sticky windows is the answer.  It might be a part of the answer, 
though.  I do like the idea of being able to stick some of my windows 
together.  But I'm not certain of doing it automatically at a system-wide 
level.

Just to be clear, I'm not saying that I don't like the idea.  I'm just 
trying to get the idea fleshed out, and trying to figure out if there are 
usability problems that could occur.

/nm