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List:       kde-look
Subject:    Re: PROPOSAL: "Mac" menubar as default
From:       "Steven D'Aprano" <dippy () mikka ! net ! au>
Date:       2000-04-29 14:51:40
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Lots of people have made a lot of good points both for and against top
of the screen style menus. My comments, for what they're worth.



A number of people complained that top of screen menus make things too
difficult for Windows users. If you want Windows, you know where to
find it. New users to Linux/KDE are going to have to learn new ways of
doing things, most of them better. What's one more thing to learn?

Besides, just how long does it take an experienced user to learn that
the menubar is always at the top of the screen? Provided the menubar
is visually obvious (more on this later), I'd suggest it takes only a
few seconds to notice it the first time - users naturally expect the
menus to be at the top of the window, and the top of the window is
close to the top of the screen - and very little time to come to
expect it there. Perhaps a couple of days of solid use, even for the
most diehard Windows user. Only actual testing of real users will
tell.

In any case, a large percentage of future users aren't going to be
ex-Windows users. They're going to be new users whose first computer
is running Linux. This won't happen overnight, but it will happen.
Surely we owe it to them to supply the best UI, not just the most
familiar?

And its a matter of record, proven by usability studies, that top of
screen menus are up to five times faster than window menus. Even
Microsoft has acknowledged this, in their Office applications in
full-screen mode, by having the menubar move up into the top of screen
position.



The opposite suggestion was also made by some. KDE should try to stand
out. Its not a clone of Windows. It stands for what's best, not what
Microsoft does. The only criticism of KDE I have come across is that
"its a clone of Windows, and not a very good one at that". This is
bunk, of course, and especially odious considering that Windows' look
and feel is a poor clone of MacOS. This view wasn't from some Windows
newbie, but from a very technically minded cross platform developer,
who uses all three major platforms (Unix, Windows, Mac).

Top of screen menus would allow KDE to answer this by saying "we take
what's best, from any platform", while still reassuring nervous IT
managers "of course KDE has menus just like Windows". Just that you
have to click a checkbox to enable them.



Others have complained that top of screen menus don't suit them
because of the way they work, with no mouse acceleration and tiny
physical movements. Well, I don't understand how that works in
practice - with a large screen, no mouse acceleration seems unusable
to me - but lets take them at their word. Top of screen menus don't
suit them. Fine. They can turn top of screen menus off.

The question isn't "Should menus always be at the top of the screen?"
but "Should KDE put its menus at the top of screen as the default?"
The answer doesn't depend on what any specific user likes or dislikes,
because he can change the setting to suit himself, but on what's best
for the majority of users. "What's best" doesn't necessarily mean
"what's most familiar" either.

I would suggest that for most users, "what's best" is top of screen
menus. For those who it doesn't suit, there's always the option to
change it.



A very good point is that KDE has to coexist with non-KDE apps, which
will insist on putting their menubars where they feel like it. This
could be an argument against *any* new feature in KDE - "but it
doesn't act the same as Gnome apps". If you want Gnome, you know where
to find it.

I notice that considerations of compatibility with KDE didn't stop
Gnome from adding draggable menus to their menubars. It wouldn't take
much for them to add a top of screen menubar option (I can *drag*
Gnome menubars on top of the KDE menubar, no problem). I'd like to
think that developers of window managers can cooperate without making
their WMs mere clones of each other.

But, even if developers insist on ignoring KDE's menubar and
implementing their own, most users will soon recognize the one or two
rogue applications that don't play by the same rules as the dozens of
others they use. (Did I hear somebody mention the Gimp?)

The point being, GUI apps under Linux are always going to have
problems with different look and feels. Apps will be written for KDE,
Gimp, Widowmaker, Ice, etc etc etc. And then users will be
inconsiderate enough to insist on using KDE apps under Gimp and visa
versa. They just have to learn to live with a certain amount of
difference.

That's not to say WM developers can't cooperate to minimize these
differences. But I'd hate to see the day that innovation was stifled
because a feature was different from the way things are done under
Windows/Gnome/KDE/whatever.



A very good point was made that, under the Macintosh, changing apps
doesn't give enough of a visual change when only the menubar changes.
This is true, but its not an issue under KDE. The Mac allows apps to
be open without any visible window. That doesn't happen under KDE, so
the user will always know what application is running based on the
topmost window.

I would suggest that the current implementation of the top of screen
menubar under KDE needs some improvement before it is good enough to
be the default (details follow in another post). But, all in all, I
believe the advantages of making top of screen menus the default
outweigh the disadvantages.


-- 
Steven D'Aprano

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