To be honest, I do not like the look of the Haiku alpha release.
However, I think that this project has the opportunity to do something truly different
and ground-breaking with its UI.
My idea is rather complicated to explain, and I am not a good artist. So bear with me.
The tab at the top of windows is really interesting visually, but what if the tab were movable. I think a tab that was able to move horizontally across the top of a window could change the way we layer windows on a desktop.
Also, after having the idea of a movable tab I had the thought that a tabs location with respect to the windows edge could have an affect on what menu options are available at the top of the window.
I had the thought that the menu bar at the top of windows would disappear, and only appear as the mouse was moved close to them. This would remove menu options from windows and make the content fill more of a window.
That was my idea. If anyone is inspired by it please draw something up and show it to us.
Yes I think that changing what options are available based on the position of the tab would definitely obfuscate the UI. The learning curve is too steep.
I’m not sure about that. For example, one could have a setting whether the tab is all the way to the left (default) or all the way to the right. Moving it afterward should not make a difference, but if you choose to set it on the right, then the menus get reversed, ie File becomes the right-most menu item.
The question is, would this make it easier for left-handed users? And we can’t pontificate about this from first principles, there would have to be real usability testing to find out.
I think that the screen real state that you get out weighs the obfuscation of the design. On something like a net book, where screen size is limited, a larger viewing window might be appreciated.
I’m not for a changing menu layout or a general hiding of the menu bar. I could imagine, however, to have a netbook theme one day that addresses special netbook needs. For example, it may be interesting to have every app fullscreen and also hide the menu bar and also unused scroll bars etc.
The limited screen real-estate available on NetBooks doesn’t justify making bad usability decisions, quite the opposite IMHO. On NetBooks, usability is paramount.
That was my general idea for a “Haiku netbook interface”. Basically just do your best to minimize wasted space. I’d say even get rid of the window tabs and borders as well as going fullscreen. With the deskbar at the top it would work pretty well. Add in Ctrl-Tab and Ctrl-~ from the Twitcher and I think it would be pretty efficient.
At some point I intend to play with this. Mainly when the browser is farther along.
