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Gnome's Nice Little GUI Perks
asdren writes "
Steven Garrity has written a short
article highlighting some 'user interface niceties' found in Gnome
with regards to file renaming, screen captures, fonts and file zooming." Garrity points out that "... tiny details can have a significant impact on the user experience
on operating systems. Inconsistencies that seem insignificant when
considering individually, but together they degrade the overall polish and sense
of stability in the system," and points out a few places where Gnome manages to avoid such inconsistency.
Didn't think Gnome *was* an operating system.
99% of my apps are GNOME compliant. With the exception fo XChat, they are also HIG compliant. That's better that the Windows desktop I used at work (before switching to Linux there as well).
i personally think the file dialog could use some improvements, (i know, this is gtk), maybe it could use a few more navigation buttons to speed things up, seems a little primitive atm ?!?!
Marge, get me your address book, 4 beers, and my conversation hat.
I read the story title as being about Nice little parks for gnomes. What a wonderful idea!
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Gnome, and the Nautilus file manager (the equivalent of Windows Explorer or Mac OS Finder) allows you to rename files only by right-clickling and choosing "Rename..." from the context-menu. While it may seem like the function is "hidden away" behind the context-menu, give that renaming files is a far less frequent tasks then double-clicking on them or moving them (click+drag), this is an appropriate trade-off. Accidentally triggered the file-renaming functionality in both Windows and Mac OS, I'm happy to report that the Gnome technique is much better.
Just checked on both Windows ME and XP, and confirmed my earlier memory of using the Right-click menu to rename files in Windows. As in Nautilus, the right click menu *does* contain the option to rename files...and I guess that's more often used than the delayed-double-click mechanism, which I think is an additional method to rename a file.
The article may have some valid comments, but when it starts off with an obviously overlooked point, it loses credibility to me. Kudos to the Gnome team though, for all it's good work.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
to get Windows a decently stable and complete Desktop? 10? 15? Let's not forget GNOME is a relative new-comer at 6 years old, and the fact that it has a fraction of the number of developers and resources Microsoft can devote to their desktop should tell you how quickly it is progressing. Yes it is far from perfect, but you simply have not been paying attention if you aren't astonished by the advances GNOME (and KDE) have made in the last 3 years.
Ahh the same way Microsoft Office doesn't use the same widgets as Microsoft Windows? And they are from the same company.
Can't something be flamebait and insightful?
The article does show why linux is more user-friendly than windows, but not in the way that the author intends.
He claims that file-renaming is better in nautilus because the only way to do it is through a context menu, and furthermore, the filename without extension is highlighted by default. Personally, I find both of those "features" terribly annoying. Quite often, all I want to do is change the extension on a file. Nautilus' behavior makes this much harder than it is in windows.
But the great thing is that there are plenty of file managers for linux, and even plenty built specifically for gnome. So I just use a different one that I like better. Choice is what makes linux better than windows, not the default behavior of one app.
That's more important than you'd think... It seems that everyone loves OSX, which is notable for having an incredible display manager and style standards. People notice the little perks like the camera-shutter sound more than they notice the bigger architectural changes.
At my job, I run a network of mainly Windows XP computers, and a small lab of linux servers with KDE 3.2 installed as the default desktop environment for whoever wants to use it. Invariably the first user comments are on the bouncing icons, translucent menus, or the fact that GAIM shows buddy icons in the main list. People generally don't care what the operating system is, but they do notice changes in the UI.
Linux has matured as a server OS, but being fast and pretty will bring it to the masses.
Why, it's been working for Microsoft for ages? Anyone remember the time around OS/2 and Windows 95 being launched, with MS constantly saying that 95 was delayed but it was going to be so damn good so you'd better just wait a bit longer and not go with that other silly IBM os.
With "point at the thing", you only get to do one action by pointing. I highly doubt renaming would be the one thing that you usually want to do a file. What? Does double clicking or command-key-clicking do the other things that you're more likely to want? Well, that's not "obvious". At least with a context menu, you get to see a list of choices.
Second: a "right-click" menu is not remotely obvious. It's clearly not obvious, by virtue of the fact that there's no indication that you can "right-click" to get a menu. For that matter, what's a "right-click" anyway?
It's no more non-obvious than a left-click. It's not even obvious that that white blob on a wire sitting near the computer is supposed to be rolled around on the desk. It looks more like a microphone to me. I've been trying to give it verbal commands all morning, but nothing's happening. It's not doing the obvious thing! Computers suck!
The user is suppose to know that if he wants to do an unusual operation on any object, he can right click on it and get a full list of choices. I'll agree that this is not obvious the first time you use a computer, but "having a good UI" does not mean that "every user is able to use the software perfectly the first time he or she encounters it".
Once the user has learned the technique, the context menu is a *much* better location for the renaming operation than the system-wide menu bar you propose. The problem w/the system-wide (or application-wide) menu bar is that it does not narrow down the number of choices based on context... to rename under this arrangement, I have to "select" the file (thus enabling "invisible" functionality elsewhere), than I have to search the menus for a rename operation, and that's very costly. With the context menu, I know that my options just apply to the file I clicked on.
Consider this... maximum visibilty would be a bunch of buttons popping up around the file whenever you hover over it. But this would be annoying. Making the user explicitly ask for the buttons to come up removes the annoyance while adding a small learning cost.
But don't take my word for it... go conduct a usability test or look through the research to see what actually works for real users.
-1, Too Many Layers Of Abstraction
In appearance yes. Of course Windows is playing catch up with Mac by appearance.
KDE has many features that windows just doesn't have, or has but doesn't get right. (I don't use GNOME, but I assume it is in a similar situation)
Just in the main browser interface, IE doesn't have pop up blocking, nor is their spell check of web forms. Virtual desktops are still not shiped with windows (despite being a feature of X11 window mangers since I first saw it back in 1993...), and handy to have. Nor is my favorite: focus follows mouse available. Sure you might not like some of them, but they handy to others, and features windows still doesn't have, in some cases more than 10 years after X11 had it.
KDE/GNOME is playing catch up in some areas true, but in other areas they have gone far beyond windows, and windows isn't even trying to catch up as far as I can tell.
...the first 10 times it was posted here. Why is it now?
It wasn't particularly insightful any of the times it's been posted to OSNews, either.
0 1 - just my two bits
I think that's his point - in Linux you just take the screenshot from a menu, but in Windows you have to go into the settings and reduce hardware acceleration, which doesn't tell you anywhere that it'll help you take screenshots. It's not really intuitive at all.
Joe Sixpack is sitting at his computer, watching a DVD. He thinks to himself, "hey, this scene is really cool. I'd love to have a screenshot of that as my desktop wallpaper." He pauses the movie and presses the printscreen button.
... wait a minute! Where's the movie? It's just a black box! Maybe I have to use Media Player to do it. Let's see, not in the File menu... not in View... not in Play... not in Tools... not in Help... What the ^%#!@?! Why can't I take a screenshot?!"
If he's using Gnome: "Hey, this is cool. I'll select the part of the image I want to keep and save it to a file."
If he's using Windows: "Hmm. Nothing happened. Maybe it's on the clipboard. I'll just open up MS Paint here, and type Ctrl+V
Remember, Joe Sixpack does not want or need a configurable machine. If it doesn't work out of the box for him, it doesn't work.
For security, the MD5 hash of this message and sig is 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0.
Each of your other points are really subjective. Your use of words like "non-retarded", "not designed by a GIMP", "I waste my time looking for 'skins' that were designed by adults" and "having to dick around with font settings" confirms that.
Maybe if you'd stick to technical reasons (not to mention the appropriate environment - Gnome, not KDE - we'd be more inclined to take you seriously.
Ironically or not, but I am using Gnome for about 5 years, and all that time I am using bash in CLI as well as (X)Emacs dired mode for all file relate operations I need. I need Gnome only for it's pannels with menus, launchers and applets. What Nautilus? Why is it important? I don't know ... I don't use Nautilus and I don't know why should I use it.
Less is more !
So you want to talk about the little details, eh? All right, here are some of the not-so-nice details about Gnome that bug me the most (these are all in 2.4, so please forgive me if these issues have been fixed in 2.5 -- I don't like running unstable versions of software as fundamental as a window manager):
1) No immediate feedback when double-clicking an icon. This is important for the user to be able to determine whether he has actually double-clicked or simply single-clicked twice on an icon, especially for apps with long load times. Both Windows and Mac do this with zooming rectangles or similar animation effects.
2) Placement of windows vis a vis virtual desktops. When I open an application or document in one virtual desktop, I would like it to stay in that virtual desktop, even if I switch to another while it is still loading. I like to open my browser in one desktop, switch to another and open my email client while the browser loads, then switch back; but in Gnome this just ends up placing the windows in whatever desktop I happen to be viewing at the moment, which I find inconsistent and annoying.
3) The "notification area" does not work. At all. It would be great to be able to see when I have new messages in Thunderbird or Gaim visually when I am on another virtual desktop, which is ostensibly the very purpose for the so-called notification area's existence; but I have yet to see it display anthing but blank space.
4) The buttons in the taskbar that represent running applications are extremely inconsistent with respect to size -- for example, when I have a single Firebird window open, it takes up more than two thirds of the bottom of my screen, but when I have two terminal windows open they take up less than a tenth that combined!
These are only a few of the things I've noticed, and only those that are "no-brainers," things that any decent window manager should take care of as a matter of course. There are other things that I'd like, such as a Mac-style menu bar -- if they must choose a single method of the two, I would have them choose a method based solely on its merits, not on its prevalence in other software or on its technical difficulty, both of which have been cited as reasons for Gnome's current choice. (I am not about to argue the point of which method is better, but note that Apple did experiment with both methods originally and ended up choosing the global menu bar because of extensive end-user testing.)
Mike
I always thought that Tk/Motif apps were the most stable. The uglier the UI, the more stable the app IMO. That said, Gnome2 looks fine to me. I couldn't think of anything I'd want improved (well, how about not doing 20 round-trips to open a menu. That would be nice.)
IMO, Gnome2 is much nicer than Windows any day, and mostly better than MacOS X (because Debian is about $300 less expensive than MacOS).
My other car is first.
This article just highlights that nothing really has changed in the Nautilus/Gnome world.
Development on how to take 31337 screenshots is given a priority, when screenshots are taken often, if at all. (I think I've taken 1 in the past three years, and that was done with xv's "grab window".) Screenshots simply aren't something worth spending time on.
Nautilus still sucks. Yea! It defaults to selecting everything before the extention! It STILL FOUR DAMN YEARS LATER doesn't support icon arranging. You either have them all messed up, or flush left in alphabetical order. What the hell? It still seems slow, and doesn't have decent plugins. I'm not a KDE guy, but Konqueror is heads and shoulders above Nautilus.
Nautilus sucks and needs to be replaced. Hopefully Velocity or Endeavour2 will mature enough to actually replace that dog.
You know, trying to learn Windows from a UNIX POV, I've found some Windows things that are still archaic as well. This creates a significant impact on the user experience.
There are dozens that I could mention, but the biggest is the window manager. Whatever the name is for the Windows window manager, it does not have snapto or window shading. This is a major annoyance when you have multiple windows up on the screen. Neither does it have easily controlled z-ordering. It is not an easy to use window manager. The look may have improved, but the behavior has not changed from Windows 3.0.
The only reason the public has stuck with Windows as long as it has is simply because they are familiar with it. No other reason.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
It's curious that Gnome and KDE based their GUI design template on Windows and not the Mac. Clearly, they're basing their design decisions on bringing a Free Windows to the masses, not a Free MacOS.
Big heavy sigh... Gnome is trying to bring Gnome to the masses, and KDE is trying to bring KDE to the masses. Neither is much interested in a free version of the Windows or Mac desktops.
There is one reason, though, why both KDE and Gnome resemble Windows in behavior and feel: users want them to. I just noticed this recently after the KDE 3.2 release, and the flurry of new "bug" reports. KDE and Gnome users want their desktops to look like Windows. So they file bug reports that saying that some minor thing should be more like Windows. They don't say it explicitly in those words, but they do say it. And the developers listen. Both desktops are evolving towards what the majority of users are most comfortable with, and since the majority of users are currently newly reformed Windows users, the direction is towards a Windows feel.
But we're getting a lot of things that aren't even on Microsoft's horizon. Like tabbed pages on every browser in the world except Internet Explorer. Before Mozilla introduced this, no one requested it. No one. But suddenly a new idea came forth and everyone had to have it. In a similar way, no one out there is lobbying to get rid of window shading in favor of the Microsoft way. They've tried it, liked it, and want to keep it. Or look at either Kicker or the Gnome panel. Both are light years ahead of the Windows taskbar, and no one is asking to go back.
This is the evolution of the desktop in action. For a while we're going to have to endure the Windows default feel. But once we get more intermediate and advanced users than newbies, this will change. We already have the changes waiting in the wings, so to speak, ready for user demand to call them forth.
Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
This makes sense. No, wait, what's hardware acceleration? I just want to take a picture from this DVD I'm playing on my computer!
... Grandma?"
Do you have any idea what kind of people use computers? Everyone! Not just people who know what hardware acceleration is, or even know where to start to find that particular slider in a control panel. It's a fucking joke that you'd be modded up for saying that, too, since having a menu entry for it is proper UI design -- because then you have the possibility of explaining it over the phone to your grandma.
"That's right, Grandma, just right click the desktop, then choose advanced, then go to the hardware tab, then you want to move that slider over and
Compared to:
"Go to the top and choose Edit, then pick Screenshot."
Your comment is a joke to people who aren't computer nerds.
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
What's with the change in panels for GNOME 2.4, for instance?
I used to have a floating panel that was set to only take up as much space as the applet (the workspace switcher) within it took up. I upgraded to GNOME 2.4 and lost floating panels. It's not even like with other GNOME feature removals, where they kept it in the form of a hidden GConf setting that no one really knows a damn thing about (since there's precisely zero documentation as to what keys do what, save for examining the source).
It's still better than KDE, but some of this crap is really annoying.
That's because Nautilus is simultaneously GNOME's file browser, and desktop manager.
It probably also gave you a swack of desktop icons, right?
The solution is to launch nautilus as 'nautilus --no-desktop' when you're not using GNOME. Then it'll just open the file manager and it won't try to take over your desktop.