Wow, sounds like a neat idea. I'm not a developer, so I can't speak for the project, but just from a preliminary read I can see that you might have to go beyond the desktop to get this to work. Do you have any implementation ideas? On Wed, Apr 15, 2009 at 2:59 PM, Arlo White <arlo.wh...@gmail.com> wrote: > I've been following the Enlightenment project for years, always > impressed by the strength of vision and dedication of the developers. > Every once in a while I take an inventory of the graphical toolkits out > there and am always disappointed by the fact that the EFL is the most > progressive desktop gui system out there and yet hasn't really broken > into the mainstream. All the other GUIs (QT, GTK, Windows) are built > around boring components (boxes, pull-downs, radio, etc.) The concepts > behind these mainstream toolkits are decades old. > > When I look at the web, I see all of the excitement about Web 2.0 and > the Cloud and "Linked Data". But it's all branded and contained within > different application spaces. You go to GMail to access your contacts > and send an SMS. You go to Facebook to update your status. You also > have your status to set on GMail, AIM, and every other application. > These things are really just implementations of a concept. This is > especially confusing to less intuitive computer users. Users have to > learn a ridiculous vocabulary to do things they already naturally > understand: (eMail, Instant Message, AIM, GMail, Yahoo, Facebook, > MySpace). Instead users should just have to think "I want to send this > to Bob" (Email/IM) or I want to tell everyone who cares about me > something (Post a Status). As the features these companies offer all > coalesce, one wonders why we need to be branded at all? Why not just > standardize on these features and give users more intimate access to > them through their own computer. > > To make things worse, this is all implemented on a HTML/Javascript layer > that was never designed for it. Developers have to wrestle with browser > eccentricities and code hackery becomes a necessary part of the > development cycle. Instead of looking for a better platform than the > browser people have over-inflated its ego (and purpose) and made plugins > for it. Now we have Ubiquity, a great idea built on the wrong > platform. Rather than take a step back and design a new standard > rendering layer we now have Flash, Silverlight, and JavaFX. The browser > is tired and overloaded, it's laden with features that belong on your > desktop, not next to your web page. > > If you've read sci-fi, or watched movies like Minority Report, you know > what could be possible. Direct meaningful interaction with visual > representations of data. I think now is the point in computer history > where that vision can actually become a reality. It's simply the > intersection of the browser, your desktop, the Web 2.0 services, and > personal management tools like OmniFocus or mind-mapping tools > (Freemind, Xmind, NovaMind, etc). > > So let me try to explain this idea more concretely... > > Imagine your desktop as a space with context. When you start working on > a project, you create a new space/desktop for it. As you open > files/email/urls it all gets associated with this context. When you > decide to work an another project, you'll close this space. Later you > come back to it, and everything is as you left it. When you search your > computer you can search within a space or all spaces, and move or link > things between spaces. A desktop will dynamically adjust to the > contents. If you have 3 pictures you're working with, they'll just be > thumbnails. If you're working with 1000 pictures, they'll be abstracted > as a list that you can manipulate. > > Now imagine that all of these things you work with have meta data and > tools associated with them. Your computer has a hierarchy of objects > and tools. For example, a picture can be scaled, rotated, color > filtered etc. Text can have different fonts, colors, be translated. > These tools are really just simple programs or scripts that are visually > abstracted. Eventually there might be a database of tools you could > download for different purposes. This is one of the more difficult > components to design well, but I think it can be done. > > Within a space you can create selections of different objects and save > the selection. Once you have a selection you can act on it in different > ways. You can act on their common properties. So since all objects > have a creation date, you can sort by creation date. If they're > pictures, you could rotate all of them. > > Now expand your concept of desktop objects. Not only can they be files, > but they can be objects from a database or a website. They might be > widgets like you would see on any of the portals (Google, Yahoo, etc) or > desktops (Google Desktop, Gnome/KDE/E widgets). They might even be > objects from the local database. > > Any of these objects can be acted on in certain ways. You can annotate, > tag, categorize, or set a due date on them. You can also create basic > elements and combine them. Rather than fire-up gEdit to take some quick > notes, you just start typing notes on the desktop. You can tag these > notes or set due dates for them, and they become todo items. You can > type some text and then start formatting it. Then convert it to HTML or > a Word Document or whatever. > > If you're still with me you have some kind of image of a desktop that > understands many kinds of files and data objects and can represent them > visually. A desktop that might look something like what you see in > sci-fi movies where you can visually drill down, make selections, apply > operations, etc. > > Imagine that you have a list of contacts that's deeply integrated with > this desktop environment. When you open a message from someone on a > space, the attachments can be moved onto your space and be manipulated > as objects, you never have to open a save dialog. Also, the person > becomes associated with the current context. These contacts have email > accounts, im accounts, facebook accounts, etc, but you don't really care > about that. You never open an email or instant message client. You > simply get messages from the person and send messages. If the person is > currently online through an im service the message is sent with that > method. You can drag any object onto a message. The computer > intelligently translates the data. So if it's a selection of rows from > a database, it inlines it in the email as an html table. There's no new > data formats or apis, when you get an email with an html table in it, > you can drag it out into your space and manipulate it and break it > apart. Imagine the power of this kind of easy communication and imagine > that every object can be sent to someone. If an object is "online" it > will give the person a link, if it's small it may inline it. In > addition, you could invite people to collaborate on your space while you > work on it. Or maybe work with online spaces stored elsewhere? > > I'm also thinking that this kind of computer environment would replace a > certain amount of work done with data mining and database tools. I > don't do much consulting work but I've encountered a few people that had > a conceptually simple problem that required a database but the tools > were just too hard to use and maintain. They really just needed a few > tables with very simple associations. Imagine if you could just > visually setup a database and define its entities and then manipulate > and search it just like any other object on the desktop. Instead of > developing custom reports for every database, you give people the > availability to create tables and charts using any kind of object. Say > you select a list of pictures, you can then graph the picture dates on a > time line. Say you have rows from a database, you can do charts with > the measures found within that data. > > Hopefully you understand what I'm getting at. The paradigm shift is > huge, but I think it's the way computers need to go. Think about it, > what does your email client or instant messaging client really give > you. Aren't they just different interfaces around the same fundamental > concept? If your computer was effective at organizing and archiving > your email why would you even use an email client application? I > believe this type of integrated desktop would completely replace your > need for separate email, instant message, task management, photo > management (Picasa) applications. > > I've been thinking about this project for a long time now and would like > to begin serious work on it. I'd like to create a collaboration space, > gather interest, and start documenting more concrete ideas and organize > all of this into realistic releases and milestones. I plan to start > coding in 2010 after I've had a chance to talk to different experts and > design the main concepts. I'm curious though if this could become the > Enlightenment Desktop or maybe the next release (0.18 or maybe 1.0)? > > If the developers are not interested in this vision than I'll probably > just start a separate Linux desktop project that uses the EFL. Maybe > call it Nirvana? > > Tell me what you think. Has anyone heard of similar ideas? I've tried > to find projects related to this but I don't even know what to search > for. It's a bit cynical but I truly believe that this is something that > won't ever come out of the big companies and can only be developed > through open source. Large web companies won't be interested because it > essentially obsoletes most of their products. No need for Google Docs, > GMail, Picasa, Yahoo's Portal/email, etc. I'm not sure Microsoft or > Apple has the vision or desire either. > > Also, tell me if I'm totally crazy or not. Do some of you think about > these concepts too? > > > Sincerely, > Arlo White > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Stay on top of everything new and different, both inside and > around Java (TM) technology - register by April 22, and save > $200 on the JavaOne (SM) conference, June 2-5, 2009, San Francisco. > 300 plus technical and hands-on sessions. Register today. > Use priority code J9JMT32. http://p.sf.net/sfu/p > _______________________________________________ > enlightenment-users mailing list > enlightenment-users@lists.sourceforge.net > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/enlightenment-users >
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