Idea for Deskbar

1

I don’t know if this has been brought up before, but I had an idea for the Haiku dock, err, Deskbar.
In current builds, when an application loads, there is no visual feedback to the user that indicates the application loading. Especially when a large application loads or the user loads multiple applications simultaneously it can give the impression nothing happens. In which case the user tries to start the application for a second time.

Haiku could use the application title-bar in the Deskbar to give the user feedback of the loading process.This can be implemented in the various possible appearances of the Deskbar.

Quick mock-up (animated gif) can be found here:

This way an application loading indicator (in a splashdialog) is not necessary and a consistent user experience is achieved.

In addition, one can also include progress indicators in the individual window titles in the Deskbar when the application expander is used, so the user has an up-to-date overview of the tasks running in windows of applications that are hidden or in another workspace.

2

I like this idea. Actually I love it.

3

I really like this idea. I have the bad habit of trying to start an application twice if it doesn’t load in a few seconds.

4

I like the idea, but rather than a progress bar I would like to see a little loading circle (like when you boot OS X) that then smoothly fades into the application’s icon.

5

I also had thoughts like Polari, of an “Ajax style” loading icon that becomes the app icon. This is also something I could use in the browser (for the windows when they are loading), so I might investigate implementing this.

Of course while this is probably necessary, in general the “Haiku style” would be to have really fast loading applications. I guess the current worst example is BezillaBrowser, which loads slow for all kinds of reasons. If anyone has some other slow loading apps please let me know.

BeOS didn’t have a wait cursor, Haiku doesn’t either, and in general we want to avoid these sort of kludges from other operating systems.

  • Ryan Leavengood, Haiku developer
6

This could potentially be an amazing way to also provide bars for downloads, and syncs.

7

always have a plan B. The nice thing about this idea is that you actually have information about the loading process instead of an hourglass that screams “I’m locking you up!”

8

Very good idea, looks great…

9

Just a thought. Why not add some Blinkenlights-like feedback per app and per window?

10

[quote=leavengood]
BeOS didn’t have a wait cursor, Haiku doesn’t either, and in general we want to avoid these sort of kludges from other operating systems.

  • Ryan Leavengood, Haiku developer[/quote]
    Yeah but sooner or later if Haiku is to be successful there will be at least one or two kludges (like office, IDE, CAD or 3d modeling programs).

You should definitely leave it as an option. Optionally if programmer thinks his software will load quickly (less than 5 seconds) then you could have an Ajax style icon.

11

The original idea of Zakalwe: “Haiku could use the application title-bar in the Deskbar to give the user feedback of the loading process.This can be implemented in the various possible appearances of the Deskbar” is absolutely awesome. If only I had thought of that =-)…
MUST implement! MUST. I was blown away when i read the post and saw the animated gif - so cool, functional and integrated… and so much more. MUST! M U S T !

12

Well I’m sorry to say the original idea probably won’t ever get implemented because I think it is very difficult for the system to provide an accurate progress bar for something like an application loading. Plus as I said I really hope and would think that such slow loading apps will be a rarity on Haiku. I still think the “Ajax style” loading icon could be done and could be useful.

13

I looked up that “ajax style loading icon” and recognized it as the hip thing of the moment that i have seen in million places from flash player in pc to my iphone. Boring and useless imho, and soon nobody uses it because it USED to be hip.

I still think that progress bar on the Deskbar is excellent idea, something BeOS would have had if it was still actively developed. The issue of ‘very difficult for the system to provide an accurate progress bar for something like an application loading’ - well, I think it could be programmed so that applications can report status to Deskbar. And the status reported can be chosen by application - when app starts it reports status to Deskbar (OS) as it loads its components (simply numeric values: 10 - 20 - 30 - 40 - etc). But why stop there? Maybe apps can report any status on Deskbar - like apps doing some work in the background, downloading something, writing to a CD etc etc. So user can have excellent overview right from the Deskbar. It would be groundbreaking, cool and yet simple. Worthy of haiku. =-)

14

Yes, the best thing to do when waiting for something, is to do something else that waste time or resources ? How about we all just keep using Windows. Thats what everyone seems to want anyway

Be already had something that showed you when a application was started
Having anything else start, display graphics, or do anything else at all, is simply going to make everything else take longer

I like the idea, but its really counter intuitive. Where I work, building and shipping custom computers, people call all the time to check on shipping status or tracking information. Every call, 1000 a day, makes me laugh a little. Why they dont understand that calling us to see how an order is going, is actually slowing down the whole process. I just dont understand
They also seem to all think that its just them, that no one else does or should call to do the same thing that they just did. That 1000 calls a day takes 3 people to answer. IF they didnt call, those 3 people could be working in building and shipping. Actually getting the systems out faster

Anyway, I dont mean to poke fun at this. I do like the idea. But we as humans really have to start realizing, that no new ideas, are the best ideas

If your going to do anything at all, just make it so the application shows up faster in the desk bar, since it has to be done, just do it first, so people know its working. But dont try to animate, and waste resources doing anything that does not have to be done. Be and Haiku I believe, both do the little animation when you click on a program, that lets you know the application has been started

15

[quote=leavengood]I also had thoughts like Polari, of an “Ajax style” loading icon that becomes the app icon. This is also something I could use in the browser (for the windows when they are loading), so I might investigate implementing this.

Of course while this is probably necessary, in general the “Haiku style” would be to have really fast loading applications. I guess the current worst example is BezillaBrowser, which loads slow for all kinds of reasons. If anyone has some other slow loading apps please let me know.

BeOS didn’t have a wait cursor, Haiku doesn’t either, and in general we want to avoid these sort of kludges from other operating systems.

  • Ryan Leavengood, Haiku developer[/quote]

This is the kind of thinking I like… Instead of trying to smooth over a problem, try to solve it instead! I suppose large programs could open a window that says “loading” before unpacking data or whatever adds time to startup, but I’m not sure we can count on all developers doing this. There might also be other unexpected delays for example when loading an app over a network disk, and as I think someone else said, providing users with feedback is always a good thing (well unless it gives devs the impression that it’s ok to write slow loading apps :))

16

I’m sorry, maybe I should expand on that
The problem at work isnt that one person calls in to check on an order
They are right in thinking that will only take 5 minutes of my time

The problem is, if we get 1000 orders that day, 500 people call in to check on their order
So that takes up my whole day, plus 2 more peoples days. And they all think they are the only person calling in, that their order is special or important

So the problem here isnt that 1 person wants to add something, its that everyone has something they would like to see or add. But when you add it all up, you get a clone of Windows. Bloated, slow, problematic, entangled, complicated, unnecessary, wasteful

The OS should be small, nimble, quick, basic, clean, fast, empty, sharp, fresh
Unencumbered by any and all ideas for looks or coolness

Let the application people make fancy animations and graphics, then you have the choice of running that application or a different application
Waste in any way promotes more waste

If the overworked people behind Haiku need to do anything, its make Haiku usable
But even after thats all done, eye candy only results uselessness

I’ve said it before, and I will say it again. Linux is free, its mature, its strong, its fast. And it still cant pull in more then 10% of the users in the world
It’s ugly overdone and complicated. Haiku needs to stay clean and simple if it expects to pull in anyone but geeks and shut-ins

17

Well that has been around a while and hasn’t become blasé just yet, because it fills a valid need of showing that something is loading when no definite progress bar can be shown. It is also very space efficient, fitting nicely in 16x16 pixels. I don’t think they will be going away soon.

Reporting progress for things like downloads or CD burning is one thing, since progress for those is fairly easy to determine. But something like application loading is just not that simple. Some apps might be like Photoshop or the Gimp and they could show progress for loading plugins or whatever, and this could in theory be reported to the Deskbar instead of in a splash screen.

But for something like BezillaBrowser, I don’t think it is quite so simple. I think the slow loading is due to loading all kinds of libraries, and certain slow application initialization, and I really don’t think Bezilla itself is aware of all that is going on when it is loading. I think the odd combination of both outside the program and inside the program processing would be hard to attach a progress bar too. That is my main argument against this idea.

18

Update: I had a suggestion here but on second thoughts it doesn’t make sense. Anyhow I’m not really in favor of an ajax style animated icon, it suggests uncertainty on stability too. And in the end there’s always the Team Monitor that tells the users when an app. is in trouble (misbehaves).

19

I re-read my post and it felt hostile. Sorry for that.

Tsteves comment actually proves my point, if I may say so: people like to know what’s going on, even to the point where it starts to interfere with the thing they are checking the status for. From christmas gifts as a kid to a health-check as a elderly person - we like to know. I guess it’s evolutionary or something…
If I click on a link (shortcut, icon etc) and expect something to happen and in after some time discover that I waited in vain, it for some reason makes me very frustrated - it’s weird but that’s the way it is (for me at least). If one deals with people every day (like tech-support, that I once did) You know that people always want to know the status of things, even if they actually just get best-estimate that they know can be very inaccurate.

Leavengood, Your point about Bezilla: is it maybe possible for Haiku to have a feature where apps can report THEMSELVES their status to Deskbar. They have a certain startup sequence that they go through and so it can be estimated how much of startup sequence is done. Like: they load the main executable - 25%, they are done loading plugins/extensions - 55%, they get done loading themes - 75%, they’re done loading interface - 95%. I obviously don’t know how Bezilla loads, but I’m just tryig to demonstrate how in theory it could work. The progress bar wouldn’t move very smoothly but that isn’t actully an issue, people just like to see some status of things. I don’t like the Ajax thing too much beacuse it has no start and finish - it could spin there for 2 seconds or 2 hours. I know progress bar would also be an illusion in a sense that it wouldn’t maybe report totally accurately progress (in sense of how much time of loading still remains) but application programmers can roughly still estimate how far in loadng the app is. And user would have something to wait for.
I think Windows XP, Ubuntu (and siblings), BeOS(!) and other OS’s all have loading status information displayed on startup.

20

I agree with your idea, the user interface would be much smoother looking in my opinion