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List:       kfm-devel
Subject:    Re: ActiveViewIndicator
From:       Simon Hausmann <tronical () gmx ! net>
Date:       1999-03-13 12:47:42
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On Fri, 12 Mar 1999, David Faure wrote:

> On Fri, Mar 12, 1999 at 09:43:49PM +0100, Michael Reiher wrote:
> > Hi all,
> > 
> > Iīm currently working on something I would call ActiveViewIndicator.
> > Itīs more or less just a practice lesson for me to get to know konqueror
> > better. See www.wh1.tu-dresden.de/~reiherm/konq.gif how I imagine it to
> > be (itīs only a photo montage right now:). First I thought of putting a
> > bar at the top of each view that is normally in the standard GUI color
> > ie default grey, and if active in the highlight color ie default black.
> > But then I thought a shade like the title bar might be much nicer. This
> > lead to the idea of putting a close button there and maybe on the left a
> > button for a popup to select the view type. IMHO itīs a nice and elegant
> > solution to show which view is active. We can of course still fine tune
> > it, eg making the bar slimmer or use the titlebar pattern. Something to
> > configure would be an optinal showing of the current URL in that view,
> > but that demands a higher bar of course.
> > 
> > So what do you think about it? Shall I continue it seriously?
> 
> It looks nice, (thanks for the drawing)
> but IMHO it looks a bit too much like MDI windows. So users
> will try to resize it using their corners (!), they will try to drag one in 
> front of another, ...
> I don't think we want a MDI filemanager. Something that looks like MDI and
> isn't, is, I think, even worse.
> 
> But, for sure, this is the nicest way to show the active view. It solves
> the View menu problem (smile, Simon !), and looks nicer than the black
> frame in konqueror 1.
> The little cross is convenient, but as I said, would tend to make users
> think that the views will behave like MDIs.
> Any solution to avoid this problem ?

Hm, this is really difficult.
OTOH I love the idea of these bars, too, because of the nice close-button
and the view-indicator-functionality. But OTOH it might be (as you said,
David) very confusing to the user, because this is something completely
new: There's some MDI like functionality/UI combined with a browser
design with it's back/forward buttons and things like that.
 
> > Michael
> > 
> > PS: I just got an idea: It could be possible to simply drag a view out
> > of the current Konqueror window and make it a new one. What about that?
> > Dontīt know if something like that could be useable or if it would be
> > just a forgotten feature.
> You see ... you're starting to consider a view like a subwindow, that can
> be dragged out of konqueror.  :))
> What I mean is : let's do either full MDI either not at all.
> The initial idea was a "splitted" window. As much splitted as we want, but
> not looking like 'nested windows' inside the main window.
> 
> What do others think ?

Hm, finally I can't make up my mind...
Full MDI: Hm,.... I don't know but I think this stands in contrary to a
          common browser design
No MDI: Looks nice, but then we're back with our "old" problem
Mixture: Perhaps the nicest thing, but also very confusing for a new user,
         or?

/me *thinking*
My vote: I like the "mixture" solution

... the right time for the guy who's responsible for taking final gui
related decisions ;-}

Bye,
 Simon

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