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Ubuntu Will Revert Window Controls To the Right-Hand Side in Next Release (neowin.net)
Following a survey carried out last month, Ubuntu will begin shipping with the minimise, maximise, and close buttons on the right-hand side of windows. From a report: In the survey 46.2% of people said they prefer their window controls on the left-hand side and 53.8% said they prefer them on the right. The decision comes after seven years of window controls being on the left, at the time it had plenty of detractors but Ubuntu founder, Mark Shuttleworth, maintained that the controls needed shifting to the left because they'd be in the way of the then newly introduced window indicators.
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...but the survey had the tick boxes on the left so I couldn't figure out how to submit my vote correctly.
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It is configurable.
It still needs a default.
Obviously they should compromise and put them in the middle.
-Dave
Even more: they have the code for doing both; why not let the user decide?
Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
Actually, no. With Gnome 3 and apps using client-side decorations and the HeaderBar where the window controls are mashed together with toolbar buttons, it's no longer possible to change window close, maximize, etc to the left side without serious hacking of GTK and possibly the apps themselves. Gtk dictates where the window buttons are going to be and what they look like (according to the GTK theme in use). So no more window manager themes in the long run.
You used to be able to disable client-side decorations which would let the window manager draw its controls still (in whatever order you configured it to), which looks a bit funny because apps will have a sort of double titlebar. However recent versions of GTK have no means for disabling CSD.
Trying to engage GTK devs over concerns about CSD won't get anyone anywhere as the devs are tired of hearing the complaints and consider the arguments tired and ignorant.
In my mind, this (client-side decorations) is a huge step backwards for usability, to say nothing of the power and flexibility that has made the Linux desktop so interesting and powerful. But hey, progress.
The buttons were moved from the right side of the window to the left side because Ubuntu was planning an amazing new feature called "windicators" ("window indicators") which were going to go on the right side of the window bar. These would show, for example, a progress bar for a background task in an app, online/offline indicator for server connection status, etc. My favorite idea: they were supposed to also provide convenient per-app volume control or mute. (PulseAudio does allow per-app volume controls but there isn't any window chrome for it; you have to go to the audio control panel, find the list of running audio apps, and control from there.)
http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/333
Windicators... never happened.
https://askubuntu.com/questions/58466/what-is-the-current-status-of-windicators
This announcement, that the window buttons are going back to the right side, indicates to me that Ubuntu has officially given up on ever implementing "windicators".
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