I am agree with Michael Rudolph. The tab concept exist for those kind of activity. Extending it will allow more of these uses. Micro blogging, facebook, chat, map/gps/location aware information, fast Internet search (semantic search in the future), small games, opening documents and send them on a projector are things that are usually done on a netbook and mobile devices. Those uses all have things in common, they does not require traditional applications, those thing can be done using plasmoid and be integrated with the tab concept. The main problem is how to fit so much use in a tab bar, nor the vertical or horizontal one can show all of them at the same time. If someone have an idea how to deal with that (and not idea like arrow at the end of the tab bar, it solve nothing), I will be happy to ear it. Back to<br>
<br>I got a new idea, when an onscreen keyboard (probably a plasmoid) appear on the screen, the tabbar can be hidden have have optimal space for the application (or activity plasmoid). Of course, this would be disable if the user selected the search box. But now, I need some implementation details on that (and on any things in my proposal, more I have, more clear it is, as I said, I never went that deep in plasma).<br>
<br> > For example while we all want "a web browser" on our devices, when our<br>
> use case says: I'm in a library and want to see how others rated this<br>
> book. We might be able to pull that off without the user knowing he's<br>
> using the web browser. He could start up the camera by opening the lid<br>
> and next to the regular shutter button is a (smaller) button, called:<br>
> identify product. Clicking it will snap a picture but also try to find<br>
> a bar code in it. Tapping the identified bar code fires of a search,<br>
> whose results allow you to buy the book, see amazon customer ratings,<br>
> find the book on google books and other related things. There's a lot<br>
> of web and and a lot of browsing involved here, but not really a web<br>
> browser.<br><br>This is the future, but not the present. I think this kind of interaction between real life, user and computer is really the next milestone in human history. A total interaction between everything -will- be the best evolution of mankind (in them of discovery and technological innovation, not in term of moral and privacy...). Just take a look at Microsoft 2019 vision video (sorry for saying this name here ;) , but they made a good job on this mockup and see the future there too). This is often called web 3.0. KDE, as a project, can use these technology that will be made available through web applications and network API. Currently, only a bunch of these things exist, like locating a restaurant near you, gathering information about a place or some time, individual (social network or the new .tel w3c initiative). Those possibilities can be extracted from web browser and made available to the user through plasmoids and activity. But we can not -yet- make use case for these activities. This years 1 proposal will concentrate on the tab framework and minimal tab/activities enabling user to truly use a MID and netbook with KDE4. Years 2, 3 and even 4 may deal with those activity. I am interested in that, but I can not go that far in a single summer. I will continue to work on this plasma branch after it, don't worry about that. But right now, it is too far.<br>
<br>I am not sure if dotevo will submit his media center proposal after all, but if an other media center proposal is being accepted, I will work with the student in question. Media center activities would be the main part of this years 1 work on the MID and, as I called the concept before Aaron asked me to use the work plasma-MID (to make sure everybody link the concept with small factor devices), alternative plasma desktop. But this can be extended to alternative way of using a computer.<br>
<br>Making an use case page on the userbase on techbase wiki is a good idea, that will surely help in a more advanced phase of the project. For now, the first use case will look like:<br><br><i>The user just ended a meeting in a foreign city. He take his nokia n810 out of his pocket. The device is in sleep mode. He open it. Now, he -want- to know the weather. He access it very easily and see that there is a snow storm coming. He now device to check for a near hotel to stay for the night. He found one in no time and now -decide- to check for a near restoration to eat before going to the hotel. All these thing are done in about 2 minute while he is standing in front of the meeting building.</i><br>
<br>In this case, I see that the interface need to have quick access to the weather and a location aware search engine. The first one can be achieve with a plasmoid while the second need a data engine or a web browser. The interface itself need to allow the user to quickly access those information because, in the first case, he know what he is looking for and in the 2 other, he took the decision from looking at the first one and had no idea before that he was looking for that. In that case, he did not configure his display to show those activity by default, but he wanted them at the touch of a button anyway. In my project, this can be translated into a (location aware, if possible (to be quicker)) weather tab and then a "current location" one with search capabilities. The first tab can be done using an existing plasmoid, adapted to be location aware and a new one gathering information from a bunch of non-existing dataengine. This years, I would try to build a framework that allow type of use to be done. <br>
<br>There is an infinite number of different use case like that one with an infinite number of different data. The framework (tab bar or similar concept) need to support those kind of uses and have a really quick and intuitive way of accessing the information. Can someone elaborate of the concept, improve/reply to this case and provide more cases?<br>