[Fedora-desktop-list] Suggestion for panel and applications menu

[Jon W. Bius]

Greetings to all-

On Wed, 2003-11-19 at 17:21, Jaap A. Haitsma wrote:


> * I find the standard gnome panel at the bottom of the screen very
> clunky, because it fills up a large part of the screen. (I know I can
> auto hide it or make it smaller.)  I find smaller panel (or 2 panels)
> like they use in ximian desktop See:
> http://www.ximian.com/images/screenshots/desktop/browsing-windows-network.png
> looking much more modern

I agree the Ximian desktop looks nice. Still- guessing how users will
set up their desktop is hit or miss. Mine ends up looking nothing like
Fedora or Ximian. If anything, I believe the targeted audience should be
new converts to Linux in general, who will be looking for some
familiarity. So keeping a Windows or Mac type feel helps give the
uninitiated user clues about what is where. Right now Fedora leans
toward a Windows look, IMO. Which is likely where you will see the most
converts coming from. It's clean, simple and straightforward. I put my
11 year old daughter in front of it- and she went right to work.

Maybe what would be helpful is some simple tutorials linked from a fresh
desktop that show the user how to change things. Teach them to customize
their desktop, and how it looks to start off with is almost irrelevant.


> 
> * I find the menus Preferences, System Settings and System tools quite
> confusing. They contain many similar menu items and  if you would make a
> quiz show in which of the three a certain setting should be set, I think
> the average user would not do that well.
> I'd like to suggest to have one "Configuration" (or whatever what you
> want to call it) menu, where you have two sections: user preferences
> (which sets options for the current user that is logged in) and system
> preferences (for setting system wide settings for which you need to be
> or become root)


I agree with you here. Every distro I've seen has fairly cluttered
menus. The sheer number of apps available is staggering. I prefer the
stock Gnome menu myself- it's rather straightforward. I'd advocate
removing as much as possible from the menus, and where possible
simplifying the categories. Again- targeting the convert, not the
experienced user.

Jon
Parkton, NC, USA
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