6 ms·

This guy has the chops to come up with a well designed concept and should have the opportunity to defend & iterate on it based on constructive feedback. Some of

by orky56 11y ago

This guy has the chops to come up with a well designed concept and should have the opportunity to defend & iterate on it based on constructive feedback. Some of these comments provide that feedback while others flatly have an issue with the idea of a concept altogether. It's unfortunate that desktop UI has remained stuck for quite awhile and only MS & Apple can really provide a new paradigm for people to adopt. Both companies are basically thinking mobile-first which makes the compromises for productive desktop UIs inevitable. By forcing ourselves to think of productivity as a priority, it brings about concepts like this which give us a glimmer of hope on how technology is more than just giving us innovation in consumption only.

dangrossman 11y ago
He's interested in the feedback and is here participating in the discussion (@ziburski). I just felt compelled to write something after reading a couple silly "you lost me as a customer" and "what's the point" comments.
- orky56 11y ago
  I actually wanted to thank you for your parent comment. It needed to be said and gave me a chance to say what was on my mind. Hope you didn't take my comment negatively.
drzaiusapelord 11y ago
>t's unfortunate that desktop UI has remained stuck for quite awhile A lot of things get "stuck" and for good reason. Steering wheel, gas, and brake. Sight, trigger, stock. Underwear, pants, socks, etc. Personally, I think the NT team really nailed the concept of the desktop back in 1993 with 3.1. The start button which hid programs and allowed access to other functions was incredibly handy, a bit like how a desk has a desk drawer within reach at all times. The desktop as a dumping ground for whatever you choose and system tray for misc stuff really, really works well and with mimimal cruft. Windows applications worked unlike MacOS applications by integrating the menu bar directly into the application itself instead of making it a detached accessory of the OS. Right-click support also allowed a lot of dynamic functionality. I understand that almost none of these specific were their innovations, but they took a lot of half-cooked ideas and made something very, very usable. Its a shame the NT team is never brought up like the Amiga or MacOS teams. I don't think they've gotten their proper due. Its also interesting that MS ran back to the start button/menu only three years after letting it go. Its incredible how powerful the NT way of doing things still is.
- Symbiote 11y ago
  I see those concepts in RISC OS¹, developed by Acorn (as in ARM, originally Acorn RISC Machines). The buttons on the left open windows containing applications and files, like the Resources window that is already open. On the right are running applications. The menu on the text editor has been opened with the middle mouse button; to complete the save action (for a first time save, or new destination) the icon can be dragged to a file window. The desktop can have files, folders or applications pinned to it, but there are none in this screenshot. The screenshot is as the OS was released in 1991. The first released version, from 1987, had similar functionality but lacked icons on the desktop ("pinboard"). (The other thing I liked about this OS was how applications were packaged. They were simply directories beginning with "!" containing, at minimum, an executable file called "!Run". This made it nice to explore, especially as !Run was often written in BASIC, and there was a BASIC editor and interpreter in ROM.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_RISC_OS#/media/File%3ARisc_OS_311_Desktop.png https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_RISC_OS#/media/Fi...
- Mikeb85 11y ago
  I think part of it too is that on the desktop, we generally stay in one or two applications for long amounts of time. For example, we'll spend hours inside 1 or 2 browser windows. All the changes is the content within the browser, the positioning will stay static for hours. Or an IDE, spreadsheet, wordprocessor, etc... - all are long-running apps, constant opening and closing or resizing isn't needed. Current DEs also get app launching right, you can have workspaces, etc... The practical difference between using the OSX, Gnome Shell, KDE Plasma 5 or KDE 4, Ubuntu Unity, even Windows - isn't all that big. You can open your app with search, resize it to half the screen or maximize it easily, and you can switch through apps easily. They've all converged with a similar set of features for everyday use, the main differences are simply little widgets here and there.
- rsync 11y ago
  "Personally, I think the NT team really nailed the concept of the desktop back in 1993 with 3.1. The start button which hid programs and allowed access to other functions was incredibly handy, a bit like how a desk has a desk drawer within reach at all times." One of us is remembering things incorrectly ... I am quite certain that the start menu interface debuted with Windows 95 and was then later adopted by Windows NT 4.0. NT 3.1, 3.5 and 3.51 all used the old Windows 3.1 user interface. Right ?
Outdoorsman 11y ago
>Some of these comments provide that feedback while others flatly have an issue with the idea of a concept altogether.< Agreed...feedback can make all the difference...if you're the affected party crowd-source the feedback on your own...what's valuable?, what's simply old-school thought thinly disguising envy?, and what's in-between...lean toward the "valuable" and pay close attention to the "in-between" if you want to have a reasonable chance of moving forward...

by orky56 11y ago

dangrossman 11y ago

He's interested in the feedback and is here participating in the discussion (@ziburski). I just felt compelled to write something after reading a couple silly "you lost me as a customer" and "what's the point" comments.

orky56 11y ago
I actually wanted to thank you for your parent comment. It needed to be said and gave me a chance to say what was on my mind. Hope you didn't take my comment negatively.

drzaiusapelord 11y ago

>t's unfortunate that desktop UI has remained stuck for quite awhile A lot of things get "stuck" and for good reason. Steering wheel, gas, and brake. Sight, trigger, stock. Underwear, pants, socks, etc. Personally, I think the NT team really nailed the concept of the desktop back in 1993 with 3.1. The start button which hid programs and allowed access to other functions was incredibly handy, a bit like how a desk has a desk drawer within reach at all times. The desktop as a dumping ground for whatever you choose and system tray for misc stuff really, really works well and with mimimal cruft. Windows applications worked unlike MacOS applications by integrating the menu bar directly into the application itself instead of making it a detached accessory of the OS. Right-click support also allowed a lot of dynamic functionality. I understand that almost none of these specific were their innovations, but they took a lot of half-cooked ideas and made something very, very usable. Its a shame the NT team is never brought up like the Amiga or MacOS teams. I don't think they've gotten their proper due. Its also interesting that MS ran back to the start button/menu only three years after letting it go. Its incredible how powerful the NT way of doing things still is.

Symbiote 11y ago
I see those concepts in RISC OS¹, developed by Acorn (as in ARM, originally Acorn RISC Machines). The buttons on the left open windows containing applications and files, like the Resources window that is already open. On the right are running applications. The menu on the text editor has been opened with the middle mouse button; to complete the save action (for a first time save, or new destination) the icon can be dragged to a file window. The desktop can have files, folders or applications pinned to it, but there are none in this screenshot. The screenshot is as the OS was released in 1991. The first released version, from 1987, had similar functionality but lacked icons on the desktop ("pinboard"). (The other thing I liked about this OS was how applications were packaged. They were simply directories beginning with "!" containing, at minimum, an executable file called "!Run". This made it nice to explore, especially as !Run was often written in BASIC, and there was a BASIC editor and interpreter in ROM.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_RISC_OS#/media/File%3ARisc_OS_311_Desktop.png https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_RISC_OS#/media/Fi...
Mikeb85 11y ago
I think part of it too is that on the desktop, we generally stay in one or two applications for long amounts of time. For example, we'll spend hours inside 1 or 2 browser windows. All the changes is the content within the browser, the positioning will stay static for hours. Or an IDE, spreadsheet, wordprocessor, etc... - all are long-running apps, constant opening and closing or resizing isn't needed. Current DEs also get app launching right, you can have workspaces, etc... The practical difference between using the OSX, Gnome Shell, KDE Plasma 5 or KDE 4, Ubuntu Unity, even Windows - isn't all that big. You can open your app with search, resize it to half the screen or maximize it easily, and you can switch through apps easily. They've all converged with a similar set of features for everyday use, the main differences are simply little widgets here and there.
rsync 11y ago
"Personally, I think the NT team really nailed the concept of the desktop back in 1993 with 3.1. The start button which hid programs and allowed access to other functions was incredibly handy, a bit like how a desk has a desk drawer within reach at all times." One of us is remembering things incorrectly ... I am quite certain that the start menu interface debuted with Windows 95 and was then later adopted by Windows NT 4.0. NT 3.1, 3.5 and 3.51 all used the old Windows 3.1 user interface. Right ?

Outdoorsman 11y ago

>Some of these comments provide that feedback while others flatly have an issue with the idea of a concept altogether.< Agreed...feedback can make all the difference...if you're the affected party crowd-source the feedback on your own...what's valuable?, what's simply old-school thought thinly disguising envy?, and what's in-between...lean toward the "valuable" and pay close attention to the "in-between" if you want to have a reasonable chance of moving forward...