RFC: Adjust the visual display of the categories in the "add resource window"

[Aaron J. Seigo]

On Friday, October 28, 2011 10:29:23 Fania Bremmer wrote:
> They saw the icons and didnt know what kind of element this is...
> normally we use icons to indicate a file, a document, a resource in
> general. So a single element. Here we use it as a general category. This
> breaks with the rest of the pattern used in Plasma Active.

aha, thanks for the added explanation, it's all clear now :))

> So we need to visually distinguish between normal resources with icons,

i wonder if using a group metaphor in the icons themselves would help. i'm 
tempted to suggest a folder icon as that is well known, but perhaps that is 
tied too strongly in people's minds to traditional file system approaches.

is there another icon metaphor for "grouping of"? i personally can't think of 
one other than "folder" (other than the very geeky "disk" icon which doesn't 
really apply here)

if we can avoid using actual buttons, that'd be great as visually they'd stand 
out awkwardly ... a drop down doesn indeed suck on touch ... 

<brainstorming>

tabs are slightly better, though that would be a significant change from the 
current UI. if the tabs were integrated visually with the top of the window 
(so the 'window itself' was tabbed) it could look nice.

putting the group icons in a list (flickable if needed) at the top and 
visually separated (using a similar visual separation as we use between peek 
and launch? though not as definite, as they aren't completely independent as 
peek and launch are) might scream "these are categories" a bit more... (mac os 
uses something similar for, e.g., the system settings window)

</brainstorming>

sounds like time for some mockups? :)

(speaking of mac, note that the original mac had this same problem as the 
folder was not an immediately recognizable metaphor on a computer screen at 
the time, despite being modeled after the real-world analog of file folders in 
vertical filing cabinets ...)

-- 
Aaron J. Seigo
humru othro a kohnu se
GPG Fingerprint: 8B8B 2209 0C6F 7C47 B1EA  EE75 D6B7 2EB1 A7F1 DB43

KDE core developer sponsored by Qt Development Frameworks
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