KWin highlight window effect enabled by default?

[Lucas Murray]

Recently the KWin highlight window desktop effect was made to be enabled
by default in the KDE Plasma Desktop workspace. As I was not a part of
the discussion to decide this I do not know the exact reason why it was
enabled by default but I would like to voice my opinion that it was the
wrong choice.

The highlight window effect is the one that, when you hover over a
taskbar item, fades out all windows except the one being hovered over.
As this animation affects the entire screen and as it can occur often
during normal desktop usage it has a large influence over the entire KDE
Plasma Desktop visual identity.

The effect is also a major part of the Windows 7 visual identity with
the Microsoft equivalent being Aero Peek.

I feel that although the effect can be an improvement to usability with
some minor changes it should not be a part of the default KDE Plasma
Desktop installation as it makes KDE feel less like KDE and more of a
blatant Windows clone.

Although it could be argued that the same can be said for the new KWin
quick tiling and maximization features being a copy of Aero Snap I do
not feel that it affects the KDE Plasma Desktop identity in any way and
can be more thought of as just being a feature that was inspired by
Windows 7 and GNOME (They have had drag-to-screen-top maximization for
a while now).

I would just like to emphasise that I believe that the effect is not an
improvement on usability in its current state either and is more of a
distraction than anything else. Having both taskbar thumbnails and the
highlight window effect enabled at the same time is redundant; having
all windows fade back in sometimes when moving between taskbar items is
a major graphical glitch; not having the highlighted windows raised to
the top of the window stack partially occludes the window and makes it
look messy. Definitely the most annoying part of the effect is how easy
it is to activate by accident.

Just to summarise: I consider that enabling the KWin highlight window
effect by default is the wrong choice and that the change should be
reverted before the next KDE SC release.

-- 

Lucas Murray
GPG Fingerprint: 0B88 499E 3F5B 1405 D952  258A AD90 B4F5 90B6 3534
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