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divtxt | 14 years ago

> Having the application's functionality split across two completely separate menus does not constitute a usability improvement.

That's putting it mildly. A split menu may be correct from some design point of view (e.g DRY principle) but from a usability point of view, it's recipe for frustration.

On a more general note, does no one else consider Mac-style "alt-tab switches apps" and "global menu" usability mistakes? (on grounds of being modal)

With both Unity and Gnome adopting these, I no longer have a compelling reason to switch from Mac back to Linux.

Which is a pity really, because Gnome 3 is one of the prettiest and most usable desktops I've seen: I love how the windows key gives you access to the dock, all windows, workspaces and search at the same time.

discuss

dfc|14 years ago

"I no longer have a compelling reason to switch from Mac back to Linux."

Even if you assume that the only thing Linux has to offer is graphical windowing environments; there are a lot of other enviornments besides gnome/unity...

Xfce, awesome, kde, xmonad, lxde, fvwm95(joke), etc....

whateverer|14 years ago

I know that the grievance is on the design decision, which is a point of a trend which the dev team will follow, but as for the window switching, there are several extensions you can install for that; just flip the switch on the webpage and it'll get installed and activated immediately:

https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/38/windows-alt-tab/

https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/97/coverflow-alt-tab/

dchest|14 years ago

Or use Alt-Escape.

duaneb|14 years ago

> On a more general note, does no one else consider Mac-style "alt-tab switches apps" and "global menu" usability mistakes? (on grounds of being modal)

Au contraire, I now consider gnome usable for the first time. The fact that apps didn't really exist but as a collection of individual windows drove me crazy.

divtxt|14 years ago

The window is the unit of focus (not apps), so I can rightly argue that switching focus should work on the unit of focus i.e. windows.

Note that I'm not arguing against having an app concept or a "switch app" action. The problem is killing the "switch window" action.

batista|14 years ago

On a more general note, does no one else consider Mac-style "alt-tab switches apps" and "global menu" usability mistakes? (on grounds of being modal)

No, modal can be good.