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List:       kde-usability
Subject:    Re: NWI: metaphor needed?
From:       Matthew Woehlke <mw_triad () users ! sourceforge ! net>
Date:       2009-07-06 20:48:51
Message-ID: h2tnvj$6f0$2 () ger ! gmane ! org
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Peter wrote:
> It seems KDE developers are slowly grasping the fact that tasks often require 
> functionality from different applications. Their solution is to provide a 
> meta-application which contains all the necessary apps. The meta-application 
> manages the real applications, so users can layout the apps as a single 
> application.
> 
> What we really want [...]

...requires a level of IPC that I don't think anyone is even 
/contemplating/ yet.

 From a technical standpoint, I think that NWI is achievable right now, 
it just needs someone to do the work (which I wish I had time for :-(, 
alas). While I'm not opposed to the level of dreaming that is happening 
in this thread, I think NWI is ambitious enough as-is, without trying to 
make it something so far advanced that it will never come to fruition.

I have, unfortunately, been down that road before. It leads to much 
dreaming and ultimate disappointment.

Besides, I think you are putting the cart before the horse; NWI will 
help get things moving to where we /can/ start dismantling apps into 
smaller pieces, without losing functionality or having to work on 
something that is a long way off.

> The problem is that the NWI does not address the task issue, but application 
> management - how to keep apps together. The moment we shift from managing 
> apps to dedicated utilities, these issues vanish because we are now looking 
> at user-apps, which survive sessions in the same way normal apps do.

...poorly? ;-)

Again, SM is a different topic from NWI, but IMO it's a harder problem. 
Right now we have a hodgepodge of SM techniques, that work to varying 
degrees of reliability. Very little is integrated cross-desktop.

What I like about NWI is that it is desktop agnostic. The goal is a 
single utility that will handle /all/ views (windows) as far as layout 
and presentation. It's a problem that needs to be solved regardless as 
long as we retain the W in WIMP interface.

> A toolbox won't replace apps, but it will enable users to intergrate them into 
> tasks and the latest technologies can be added as new tools. If NWI is used 
> as a framework to create user defined apps, it will do for the GUI what 
> KParts did for the desktop.

That's the most sensible thing I've seen in the previous message :-). 
And... yes, that's much more what I'm thinking NWI should be doing.

-- 
Matthew
Please do not quote my e-mail address unobfuscated in message bodies.
-- 
It is training and experience that gives us the ability to abstract 
problems, remain objective, use previous knowledge, interact with users, 
and herd cats.
   -- Celeste Lyn Paul, on Usability Experts

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