[desktop-discuss] [indiana-discuss] Indiana desktop UI spec - 2nd draft

[Calum Benson]

On 17 Apr 2008, at 20:57, Richard Elling wrote:

> Harumpf!
>
> Calum Benson wrote:
>>
>> On 16 Apr 2008, at 18:37, Richard Elling wrote:
>>
>> I'm with you 100% on choosing good defaults and not asking  
>> unnecessary
>> questions.  But there is no such preference in this case, so
>> completely rearranging one's panel layout later requires considerably
>> more effort than just checking a box somewhere.
>
> That is a different problem.  Unless I missed the memo, we're talking
> about which bar is on top and which is on bottom.

Well, it's a little more than that.  The two most popular options were  
(as expected) "one panel, with a launch button", and "two panels, one  
with a menu bar instead of a launch button".

If it were just a case of the user wanting to swap the position of the  
panels, then sure, they can already just drag them around however they  
like.  But to switch from (say) the suggested one panel layout to the  
suggested two panel layout, they'd currently have to:

- figure out how to add a new panel (not as obvious as it ought to be)
- drag some stuff from the original panel to the new panel
- delete the launch button from the original panel
- add the menu bar to the new panel


> Pick one and go
> with it. Savvy users will do whatever they will. But people who write
> docs or manage help desks will really appreciate a single, known
> default.

True (although where helpdesk support is being provided, sysadmins  
would probably do well to lock down the panels altogether anyway).

Cheeri,
Calum.

-- 
CALUM BENSON, Usability Engineer       Sun Microsystems Ireland
mailto:calum.benson at sun.com            GNOME Desktop Team
http://blogs.sun.com/calum             +353 1 819 9771

Any opinions are personal and not necessarily those of Sun Microsystems