I use solid dark grey, with thin light grey lines indicating standard screen sizes (800x600, 1024x768 and so on). Very effective in terms of contrast and color perception. (If I want nature, I look out through the window ;)
Concerning your idea on visual emphasis/layering/structuring of desktop: I have used similar approaches when presenting collections of demos made in different programs on one computer for people to try out. I drew a desktop with labels, visual areas and brief instructions, then simply placed shortcuts to the different demos in the right places on the desktop. Seemed to work quite well as long as people remembered to shut down their sessions and expose the desktop for the next visitor (which they didn't always do, of course). Another related idea -- back in 1999, I argued that a useful way to get fellow researchers to make public material available through digital archives would be to lower the effort threshold for web publication. This lead to the idea of a public drop zone on the desktop where you would simply drop a file to have it appear in a web- accessible archive that others could browse. Didn't have the time or skills to implement it, though. Regards, Jonas Löwgren ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://gamma.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://gamma.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://gamma.ixda.org/help
