On Jan 19, 2007, at 8:32 AM, Ethan Anderson wrote: > > What we need is a feature that lets the user set a desktop mode or > property such that all windows are maximised by default, and whenever > focus is put on one window, the other windows are minimized. A > feature. That simple. All too often, I have to do that myself. And > then, transparency looks ugly. It could be quite elgant with that > simple set of preferences. > > Please do this. You can never regret giving the user an option.
You must be new here. ;-) > Defaults, however, can vary by distro. We should make "orange", > where everything is layed out for elegance and speed. To counter > apple's macs, of course. Maybe that's just ubuntu. Ironically since you mention Apple, Mac OS X betas had this: a "single-window mode" button in the title bar, that when turned on made only one window appear on-screen at a time. It was pulled before 10.0. > Still, can anyone deny that this feature is a good idea? Looks like > this: > Settings preset one: "Workstation mode" > <X> enable single-window mode > <X> maximise all frames by default Any time a control's label starts with "Enable", there's something not quite right. (It's the interface design equivalent of what programmers call a "code smell".) Sometimes the label can be reworded to express something users might actually be interested in doing. Sometimes it can't, which is a good sign that the option shouldn't exist. > Then, the user could switch between settings sets as well. Like, > settings themes. Imagine that. Enable Windows settings theme, or > enable Mac settings theme. A good platform is chameleon. > That is flexibility and power. Them: "I just made a DVD of my photos and movies. Can your PC do that?" You: "No, but I can auto-maximize my windows. Ha!" -- Matthew Paul Thomas http://mpt.net.nz/ _______________________________________________ Usability mailing list [email protected] http://mail.gnome.org/mailman/listinfo/usability
