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List:       kde-look
Subject:    Re: Pooling task bar buttons.
From:       Dave Leigh <dave.leigh () cratchit ! org>
Date:       2002-02-09 16:03:30
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On Friday 08 February 2002 11:50, Sean Pecor wrote:
> > Well, I hope it helps.
>
> Tabs are only useful on a desktop if there is a fixed and small number of
> them. Tabs inside applications to separate documents ensures that the
...

> I think we should keep in mind that the Tab metaphor was borrowed from
> filing cabinets. Filing cabinets are used to store documents that are not
> often referred to. They make documents easier to find by grouping them, but
> an office worker in the year 1890 opened file cabinets how many times a
> day? Maybe once or twice in eight hours? We're talking about a visual
> metaphor that would get accessed about once every couple of minutes. Do you
> know what people do with paperwork they reference often? I do. It's piled
> together in one or two stacks on their desk! ;). They glance once at the
> pile, see what they need, and pull it out. This requires a very simple
> thought process and is quite similar to the task bar. It's less disruptive
> to most work processes.

Sean, I have to take exception with you on a technicality. Granted, that's 
where the tabs come from, but you ALSO have to keep in mind that the purpose 
of them was to index these files and make them more accessible. Hence we have 
tabs, not just just filing cabinets, but in some high-traffic filing systems 
such as Rolodex files. 

(BTW, filing cabinets were accessed far more than you seem to think. Remember 
that they were the only filing system of the time, and in many businesses you 
didn't know which folders you were going to need for the day. A good example 
that still exists is an Urgent Care physician. He cares for walk-in patients 
and their medical records are pulled at need).

The problem comes when a metaphor is mis-applied. In the physical world, tabs 
are an indexing tool. It's when used as something other than an indexing tool 
they're mis-applied and less effective. That would seem to be the real 
problem with Julien's suggestion. Although I also appreciate tabbed editors 
(like gedit), when you get a large number of documents open the tabs slow the 
user down, as you've observed. Also, I've never seen an application that 
arranged the tabs in any order other than the order in which the docs were 
opened (probably should be alphabetical by title). So the tabs are useless as 
an index. It's a misapplied metaphor. 

So while I agree with your objection, it's for a different reason. The number 
of tabs is irrelevant: it's the misapplication of the metaphor that's the 
problem. Tabs are used in a way that's not approprate.

> Another example is with tools. A construction worker that is "framing up" a
> house carries all of the tools he/she will use for the work session. They
> can look down and instantly see and access the tool needed in one glance.
> They don't have to think "where did I put that tool?" which is a pretty
> complex and disrupting thought process. Tools that are rarely used are kept
> in tool cabinets which have drawers and compartments that can be compared
> to tabs in their purpose.

That's a different metaphor entirely. The builder wears a toolbelt, and 
everything on it is in a particular place. It's a portable subset of his 
toolbox. Probably the best electronic analog I can think of at the moment is 
the Windows Briefcase. (or maybe your KDE desktop itself. After all, you have 
a huge number of tools in /usr/bin, but those that you want ready access to 
have icons on the desktop or an application dock, or the like. Two 
differences: 1. the Briefcase, like the toolbelt, is portable. 2. The 
briefcase doesn't normally carry software tools; instead it carries documents)

> Hey, is there anything else I can over-intellectuallize? ;)

Maybe. Keep trying.

-- 
dave.leigh@cratchit.org
http://www.cratchit.org

"Flattery is all right -- if you don't inhale."
-- Adlai Stevenson

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