the OS should handle this and just kill the app automatically.
I can just hear it now… "I try to open this application, and then it disappears" calls to the company helpdesk…
arielb wrote:the OS should handle this and just kill the app automatically.I can just hear it now… "I try to open this application, and then it disappears" calls to the company helpdesk…
There should always be feedback for this type of problem. Crashed apps should not be a common occurrence - and the OS should NOT just remove them automatically. If anything, a crashed app should be an extremely visible problem, with a lot of feedback to the user (maybe with an option to "leave me alone if this happens again") - this encourages users to contact application developers to report the problem and get it fixed.
Is there really a need for descriptions below the icons?
They’ll get illegible soon when you start scaling down.
Also, in the vertical layout, relatively long descriptions like ‘Workspaces’ turn squares into rectangles, making the total not lined up…a bit messy.
Simply using textfields that appear when hovering an icon would be a better way, IMHO.
And the time-digits remind me of the ugly Linux ones. If you want to suggest a digital clock, just try the dotted, rounded version (like what you often see on modern car stereo displays).
I like the white on grey!
I’m never going to see this scrollbar. I think it’s better to have a left and right arrow at the edge-sort of like how firefox 2 handles lots of tabs
I think there should be a dialog for crashed apps. maybe a talkback so that you send the crash info. Then when you click ok, the app will go away.
I just don’t see a need to indicate this on the deskbar. Nobody will know that pink means it crashed since it shouldn’t be so common!
http://code.google.com/p/airbag/ open source talkback
I reckon the best thing when a user has many apps open at the same time would be for your ‘deskbar’ to scale down the icons.
How about allowing any file to be dragged in, not just applications?
Directories could present a drill-down menu when clicked, with an option to open in Tracker from the right-click menu. This way the user would be free to add icons for Disks, Desktop, Apps - anything that can be accessed from a directory.
By dragging in saved queries you can have things like Unread mail, Resent files, Favorite music. The only limitation is the user’s ability to come up with creative query definitions.
How about allowing any file to be dragged in, not just applications?Directories could present a drill-down menu when clicked, with an option to open in Tracker from the right-click menu. This way the user would be free to add icons for Disks, Desktop, Apps - anything that can be accessed from a directory.
By dragging in saved queries you can have things like Unread mail, Resent files, Favorite music. The only limitation is the user’s ability to come up with creative query definitions.
yes…
I think the deskbar today is the right way, all we have to do, is to modernize it a little bit.
One idea I have, is semi-transparent deskbar. Once it gets focus, it gradually goes to non-transparent state. Other idea is something like dock on Mac, but with BeOS flavour - not so big, no unnessesary bells-whistles like growing icons. It has Haiku menu at left and clock on the right end. In the middle there-s running apps list like Deskbar today has, except it has dynamic size depending how many windows are open. And it should have some kind of transparency so ti wouldn’t hide other programs when it’s on top.
I think the deskbar today is the right way, all we have to do, is to modernize it a little bit. One idea I have, is semi-transparent deskbar. Once it gets focus, it gradually goes to non-transparent state.
I’m not so sure transparency is such a good way to improve it, though. Most of the time, this kind of effects only add eye candy at the cost of computing power. Very seldom does it actually contribute to usability.
Something that always bothered me about the R5 deskbar was that unless you opted for expanded apps, any window was two clicks away instead of one. Also, left- and right clicking did the exact same thing. I think an improvement would be to send all windows of an app to the front/back when left-clicking, and present a menu only when right-clicking. This kind of simple usability improvements are far more sane than adding special effects, in my opinion.
What I would looove to see, by the way, is the above mentioned deskbar change coupled with "tabbed frames" as done by certain X11 window managers. This just makes so perfect sense for Haiku in my eyes. Go read the first paragraph of the about section for PWM to see what this is about.
Other idea is something like dock on Mac, but with BeOS flavour - not so big, no unnessesary bells-whistles like growing icons. It has Haiku menu at left and clock on the right end. In the middle there-s running apps list like Deskbar today has, except it has dynamic size depending how many windows are open. And it should have some kind of transparency so ti wouldn't hide other programs when it's on top.
right click should bring up the context menu. windows xp taskbar does this correctly
Wow,
This is like Windows 7 a year before Vista!
Thanks! Glad I got some credit… no thanks to M$
Wonder when their concept was originated…
So in your example, if i click on bemail, it would turn white. Let's say there was another link to the right of bemail. so does that mean bemail moves to be with all the other white icons?
Yes it would turn white, however it would always stay in one place, unless you drag it one way or another
And of course, if there was only one window, just one click should open it. When I used BeOS I had to click 2 times!
of course, that’s one of the things I didn’t like in BeOS
and that a thin scrollbar under the bar? I don't think that's such a good idea. to hard to click on
I agree, however it’s not supposed to be a scrollbar, it’s supposed to scroll with the mouse wheel
now the crashed apps...i'm not so sure this should be in the UI. the OS should handle this and just kill the app automatically. Of course, there should be session saver for every app.
I disagree, any notification should gradient between white and red (animation?) I’m not a big fan of that jumping Jack Russel terrier thing on MacOSX
Is there really a need for descriptions below the icons?
No, it should be able to be turned off, I’m just not a big fan of hieroglyphics
Also, in the vertical layout, relatively long descriptions like 'Workspaces' turn squares into rectangles, making the total not lined up...a bit messy
I can always use a “…” or just widen it a little… how does the deskbar do it now?
And the time-digits remind me of the ugly Linux ones. If you want to suggest a digital clock, just try the dotted, rounded version (like what you often see on modern car stereo displays).
Fonts are drawn in paint, and should only be criticized in bikeshed mode… much later than concept…
I like the white on grey!
Thanks!
I'm never going to see this scrollbar. I think it's better to have a left and right arrow at the edge-sort of like how firefox 2 handles lots of tabs
It won’t show unless you have a boatload of apps or links, or queries, or folders or whatever else you want to link here… technically you can put your inbox there if you want…
I think there should be a dialog for crashed apps. maybe a talkback so that you send the crash info. Then when you click ok, the app will go away.
Notifications are the recent solution… I like how WebOS did it… not a big fan of Android’s… maybe put the notifications where the clock is?
I just don't see a need to indicate this on the deskbar. Nobody will know that pink means it crashed since it shouldn't be so common!
Ahh… but it’s not just pink, it’s any color between white and red… it gradiates slowly up and down to show you something has crashed… not just the application, but any application window… it’s a multi threaded OS after all…
Check out OS/2 Warp 4 deskbar too (from one of the better GUI around some years ago), but the “modernization” we need is clearly represented by SkyOS (which is dead, hopefully Robert Szeleny can “donate” it to the open source community):
Them we could “grab something” (or, better, get inspiration) from Sharp Enviro:
…a mix-up of these two could be MUTCH attractive for users ! 
please not
i think the gui is in haiku nice. From Desing side need we a Designer Team and a coder Team!
i like a css like theming engine and all color can have a texture.
But this idear need some Brainstorming …
I actually like what Palm did with webOS (yes I’m a lover of more than one os)
They made it so every part of the OS would be code-able through CSS JS and HTML5. If Be would have been funded properly to pursue BeIA, it would have eventually become something like WebOS.
Might be interesting to make a window manager based on webkit, so you would just need to make a web application to make an application, of course you would be dumb to not also be able to make a Haiku C++ Application as well.
Oh ye gods, a browser-based desktop is the last thing we need. Part of what’s neat about Haiku is how light and responsive the OS is; good luck maintaining that when you have to slather a Javascript interpreter and CSS/HTML renderer on top of it just to draw windows. There are far simpler and lighter ways to introduce window styling.
(And allowing “web applications” into a desktop environment is only going to result in a lot of poorly-developed JS applets flooding the system like it’s 1997 and someone wanted to put spinning text around the mouse cursor on their GeoCities page. Yeesh.)
I’ll be working on this again this weekend, more like the practical application part, but I will be adding an option to run this code…
Hi,
Is it possible to have menu and window design with colour gradient like this ?
Hi there, I like your idea and have expanded on it/come to similar conclusions. Mine’s a little different though, and still just a mockup. I haven’t read all of your posts yet, but i was wondering if you would like to take a look at this idea/collaborate:
https://www.haiku-os.org/community/forum/ki_koan_interface
also I have a oneNote notebook on the web where i am assembling my ideas for a GUI revamp update for Haiku: