[Panel-devel] bumptop plasmoid --> piling & zooming & lifestream & strigi metasearch pile-file-handling

[Johannes Neugschwentner Jr]

Hi Guys!

I've been talking to Aaron and ruphy once about this, since it's getting time 
for me (my thesis) i'm making this kind of public now and asking for help.

I'm writing my thesis on the user-centered desktop.

Theory is about:
* The GUI
         - history,development 
        (Mike Tuck, Douglas C. Engelbart, Jeremy Reimer,
         - the desktop metaphor & alternate developments 
        (filing, piling, lifestreams - beyond the desktop metaphor, mit press)
         - the social dimension 
        (beyond the desktop metaphor, mit press)
* Designing Interactions (this is where HCI comes in)
        (based on the book Designing interactions by bill moggridge)
         - designing for everyday life 
        (david little, team leader at the xerox star interface)
         - how do you ...? 
        (bill verplank, xerox star guy again ... 
        about the process the designer developes an idea into 
        an metaphor or scenario)
         - design adopts technology 
        (david kelley, IDEO ... about sociological integrated technology)
         - things should be themselves 
        (durrell bishop ... about designing functionality)
         - designing interactions 
        (bill moggridge ... about ideo and the actual science of designing 
        interactions)
* Design Patterns
        (based on the book Dsigning Interfaces by Jenifer Tidwell)
        - what users do
        (safe exploration, instant gratification, satisficing, choices, 
memory..)
        - making it look good
        (basics of visual design, typical patterns)
        - maybe staff to be added here

Now I'm going to do a prototype as practical part of the thesis.
i've planned it to be something like bumptop.com, but in 2d.
first i planned to do it in adobe flex, then i thought about haxe.org 
utilizing screenweaver hx or xinf.org ...
then i stumbled across plasma ...
and well, i'm a passionate gentoo user and lover of kde.
have always wanted to contribute

what i want it to be:
-----------------------
i basically love the idea of piling & lifestreams.
(attached mock-up by ruphy, thx :)) 
this means to me basically:
        you *can* go on organizing your files in hierarchical file systems 
manner, 
        but there's another way too
        --> just as the desktop used to host icons ... you can now host files 
	in the manner of svg-icons ... which you can toss around, organize 
	in piles etc.
        these files are not necessarily saved in ~/Dekstop, but anywhere you
	want them to live. 
        this is where strigi/kmetadata shall come in.
        - seek files through some metadata ... eg. all mp3's from some Artist
        - the search is gonna result a pile or a list which you can drop on 
	  the desktop
        - the views/piles are to be saved in some xml ...
        - if you create a new file via the desktop you gotta tell where to 	
	  save it + metadata
        - you can have one file in various piles ... grouped my some 
          meta-task-related thingy
        - i love the idea of some metatransparent menu that comes up on hotkey 
	  or pile grab or so ... think of alias/wavefront maya space-key action
          there could be user-specific regions where you could drag your piles 
	  to group them, delete them. save them, ... *WHATEVER!!!!* -- and 
	  user-specific ...
        - some basic physics, all in 2d ... snapping to other items or 
	   piles ...
        - maybe basic collision detection??
        - in an advanced version one could drop any item from any app and make 
	   them 
        files then organized via metadata (maybe some useless local location 
	for items where literal physical hierarchical file placement is useless)

BE ASSURED:
* i will do this, it is part of my thesis which i really want to finish *g*
* i really want to do it for/in plasma
* i must finish til end june, latest mid-july (basic version ... if so, i 
would love to go on developing it and even become active kde-developer)
* my c++ is a little bit rusty
* my qt-knowledge is pretty basic
* i've basically been web-designer so far (haha, but a good one --> 
www.hauni.at = my old site)
* i've looked around, talked to people, have my working kde4 development 
environment ... did the tutorials and had looks on the plasma code so far.
* did figure out how a plasmoid would probably be by looking at the 
clock-plasmoid

I NEED TO KNOW:
* will it be ok for you to somehow integrate it into plasma?
* what kind of opinions/suggestions/whatever do you have?
* i think you probably planned some metasearch-engine anyway??? this true, do 
i have to write this on my own? i consider it to be advanced for such a 
beginner as i am
* i somewhere read about some item interchangability thing between 
kde-applications ... does something as that exist? do you suggest i should 
think about implementing something like that?
* does anyone have any suggestions for graphics/code/class design .. whatever?
* do you think i'm crazy/mad/out of my mind? you're probably right - i'm even 
a beginner ...
* i love it ... ahh .. well, that's what i actually know
* will someone help/mentor me on the coding?

FIND RUPHY's MOCK HERE: http://files.ruphy.org/bumptop-plasmoid.png
if anyone wants to have my theoretical thesis, tell me, consider it's 
german ...

-- 
Johannes Neugschwentner
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://mail.kde.org/pipermail/panel-devel/attachments/20070522/901f5682/attachment.pgp