activities overview, take N

[Marco Martin]

On Monday 12 October 2009, Chani wrote:
> > so what's wrong with the overview thing in gnome-shell? in one word: it's
> > modal.
> 
> now that I think about it, that's part of what was wrong with the zui too.
> 
> > applications would get little dummy representations of themselves drawn
> > in little boxes. i kept thinking "this is really just another form of the
> > tasks widget".
> 
> yep, "a fullscreen taskbar + activity bar" ;)
> 
> > * in the same panel controller window that we now show the Add Widgets
> > interface, we could show a Choose Activity interface. it would share a
> > lot of presentation code with Add Widgets for consistency.
> 
> hmmmmm. interesting.
> 
> > * instead of categories in the tab widget it would have  "Active" and
> > "Stored". instead of destroying an Activity, you could store it for later
> >  use. these stored Activities would then show up in the Stored section;
> > an rc file and a screenshot pic would be saved to disk for each stored
> > Activity. store and trash would perhaps appear in the hover interface
> > that pops up when the icon is moused over or in a touch based world
> > selected.
> 
> +1; fits perfectly with how I imagine containment saving. we could make
>  them draggable to the other tab too.
> 
> > * a "New Activity" tab would appear Active and Stored and would allow you
> >  to create a new activity, including picking what kind of activity and
> >  optionally what other activity you would like to clone
> 
> interesting. I ended up going with the "don't force any decisions, just
>  create the damn thing and they can configure it later" approach. do you
>  think it's better to offer options at creation time?
> 
> as for cloning... I have, for quite a while now, secretly wanted a "clone"
> option for any applet. mostly for the notes plasmoid and for containments.
>  can we get cloning implemented in Applet so it's available for applets not
>  just containments? :)

i think that's a not bad idea, wonder how to do the ui, just another context 
menu entry?

> > * associating a Window with an Activity could happen in one of two
> > places: a new button in the window title bar (would mean some adjustment
> > to kwin) that would list activities from nepomuk. the other place would
> > be the context menu of items in the tasks widget
> 
> think about the "to desktop" menu that appears in the contextmenu of both
>  the window title and the taskbar entry. I would've just copied that; it's
>  useful but not very discoverable.
> having a new titlebar button available? hmm. could be a good idea.
> the other way I move windows to other desktops is by dragging... I like
> dragging... :)
> 
> > * the tasks widget could have an added "show only windows for the current
> > activity" feature
> 
> +1
> 
> > * a "hidden windows" button could be shown in the tasks widget when there
> >  are hidden-by-activity-change windows around; switching to one of those
> >  windows would switch the activity as well?
> 
> I'm not sure. we don't do that for desktops. but because we don't do that
>  for desktops, I've seen people lose windows. :)
> hey, can we do that for desktops right now and see how it works? :)
> 
> > * a "Choose Activity" button would appear in the toolboxes (panel and
> >  desktop)
> 
> +1
> 
> hrm. when I first read this I was thinking "popup menu with plain list of
> activities", but actually showing the activity bar would make more sense.
>  is that what you meant?
> 
> oh hey, a bit offtopic but I have a feeling the keyboard-shortcuts button
>  in the cashew would really be better off in that new plasma KCM... must
>  remember to do something about that...
> 
> > * the kwin desktop grid effect would have remove/add buttons added to it
> > to fill the virtual desktop management gap a bit more; we should offer a
> > plasmoid to trigger it and perhaps add it, by default, to the panel
> 
> sure, and my next plasma patch (soon as I stop freaking out about robocup)
> will be an "add desktop" action in the pager. I've forbidden myself from
> changing my number of virtual desktops until I add that action ;)
> 
> a generic "trigger kwin effect" plasmoid should almost be a Junior Job :)
> 
> > * windows associated with an activity could be listed in the mouse over
> > pop up in the Choose Activities interface
> 
> +1
> hmm... can we drag windows to the activities somehow? would there be an
>  easy way to unassociate windows from the activity bar?
> 
> > * in a-containment-per-virtual-desktop mode (which i'm starting to feel
> >  small amounts of regret over offering ... but maybe i'm just being
> >  pessimistic :) the "Choose Activities" would be per-virtual-desktop. if
> >  you wanted to migrate an activity from one desktop to another, you'd
> > have to store it first. the more i think about per-virtual-desktop
> > containments the more i cringe, though.
> 
> this paragraph makes me cringe. I don't get it and I'm not sure I want to.
>  o.0 certainly for different *screens* that mechanism makes perfect sense
>  (or I seem to remember thinking it was the best way).
> let's see.. the "current" activity is per-desktop.. so then if you want to
> switch, you can change desktop... but for each desktop there can be windows
> hidden because they're on another activity... uurgh. don't wanna think
>  about it :P
> 
> although it does make me wonder... do multi-monitor people want both their
> monitors to switch activity at once, or do they want to be able to mix &
> match?
> 
> > there's probably more than could be done along this line of thinking. any
> > ideas?
> 
> what happens to associated windows when their activity gets stored?
> 1)do they forget their association?
> 2)do they remember their association and reassociate themselves if that
> activity comes back?
> 3)do they get stored too somehow, like a mini-session?
> 
> I think #3 could be kinda awesome - you could stash away a bunch of work
>  you were doing on a project with resource-hungry apps, and provided the
>  apps supported session stuff properly, you could just restore that whole
>  project again later with hardly any effort. :)
> 
> if it's a lot of work, we could leave it open as a feature to add in 4.5 or
> something.
> 
> one thing that could be tricky is handling multiple-associations sanely.
>  it'd be really cool if we could get a window associated with three
>  activities (say, my konq window for generic school stuff, associated with
>  every course activity) to be stored when the last school activity is
>  stored and restored when one of those activities is restored. sort of a
>  smart combination of #2 and #3.
> 
> ---------
> 
> associating a window with >1 activity... how can that be done gracefully?
> when doing it from the taskbar, do we have an "activity" submenu with
> checkable actions? do we have two submenus, "copy to activity" and "move to
> activity" like kopete does for contact groups?
> if windows/tasks are dragged, I assume that counts as a move; not only are
>  you physically moving something, but I expect move will be a far more
>  common action than copy.
> 
> > the basic change in direction is that instead of making it a full on mode
> > a person must switch into to get an overview of things, it becomes part
> > of the overall system that doesn't require you to put away your windows
> > and other tools in the meantime.
> >
> > thoughts?
> 
> it's a good idea.
> 
> /me ponders
> 
> I might still be interested in some sort of fullscreen window organizer...
>  oh, wait. that's what composite is for. :/
> well, maybe I'll make an "organization" acttivity that just has a really
>  big taskbar on it ;) or I'll make a plasmoid that's designed specifically
>  for managing every little detail of windows and their associations to
>  desktops and activities.
> 


-- 
Marco Martin