Re: why kde and gnome's menu situation sucks
Hi,
To expand on my ideas about why paring may not be synonymous
with user friendliness; when it comes to decisions on paring, there
mayt be different opinionswhat is the best of breed app. Perhaps the
paring mechanism needs be policy driven. I would like to plug in new
user menu selection policies, and use someone elses opinion about
best of breed and how the menus expand on demand, offering more
choices as we go on.
The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that there
*MUST* be help for the user to transition from a newbie to one
familiar with the system, and finally to expert.
I am thinking that user friendliness may be to have someone
like a wine critic, offering opinions on great vintages, to tell you
how to select between apps, perhaps pointing to the best of the lot,
and telling you why if indeed you cared?
So initially the menu offers web browser, and you can call it
up, and a web browser starts, depending on current policy.
But you can expand the entry, and it expands into two
panels in the same menu graphical: mozilla, galeon, konq, phoenix, opera
text: links and lynx
The problem is not choices: the problem is presentation, and
prioritization, and a major lack of coherence (I should find similar
apps on the same menu panel, not deep down in different heirarchies).
If I am using Gnome, perhaps the gnome apps bubble to the top,
and perhaps all unexpanded menus show only gnome apps; expanding the
entry shows kde apps at the bottom of the list.
again, I exhort people in the desktop effort to think about
presentation, not limiting choices, and also about helping the user
learn about the system, and extract the maximal benefit of the power
under the hood, _at their own pace_.
manoj
--
Ambidextrous, adj.: Able to pick with equal skill a right-hand pocket
or a left. Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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