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> The "big buttons" are that size because people have all sorts of accessibility needs different from your own What accessibility needs are you targeting when

> The "big buttons" are that size because people have all sorts of accessibility needs different from your own What accessibility needs are you targeting when you make the buttons and titlebars bigger? Why did this change drop suddenly? Was there a cry from the majority of your users that the widgets are too small to use with desktop inputs? Usually when there are accessibility issues you add options to deal with that, you don't change everything for a relatively tiny percentage of your user base. Would you make all your widgets have max contrast and double the font size by default because it improves accessibility for the visually impaired?

audidude 10y ago
> Usually when there are accessibility issues you add options to deal with that, you don't change everything for a relatively tiny percentage of your user base. Would you make all your widgets have max contrast and double the font size by default because it improves accessibility for the visually impaired? There are way more types of impairments than visually impaired. We do have high contrast themes to help with a subset of visual impairment. (Even visual impairment is a wide-spectrum). Many of us may not particularly like touch screens, but an incredible number of computers that run Linux/BSD these days have touch screens. Things should work out of the box for these computers whether or not you want one. So we can make arbitrary guesses at what the "majority" is but the reality is we have a lot of hardware that we should support. Getting real statistics about users in F/OSS is difficult due to the high overlap of people interested in personal privacy. So we try to make as informed of decisions as we can. Additionally, more computer users than you might image have various difficulties in using the computer. Even if its not a majority, say one in ten, is still a large number of users. Count yourself lucky that you don't have an impairment (right now). It is common that people have an impairment at some point in time (RSI, broken arm, etc). I certainly agree that HiDPI is often way too large today (again due to the need for compositor integration), and I also agree we should have a condensed mode. However, I'd probably argue to implement a condensed mode on top of an effective 1.5x scaling (3/2) rather than yet another option in the toolkit/themes.
- twotavol 10y ago
  Why are you lecturing me on visual impairment and disabilities? At no point did I claim you ignore that user base. >Many of us may not particularly like touch screens, but an incredible number of computers that run Linux/BSD these days have touch screens. Things should work out of the box for these computers whether or not you want one. Okay so after all that we get to the root of the issue. Instead of a good traditional desktop experience, you want to provide a mediocre desktop/touch hybrid experience. Instead of doing one thing well, the aim is to do multiple things poorly.
  - audidude 10y ago
    I am trying to not come off as lecturing. My apologies if it was interpreted as such. You were making claims and I'm simply trying to provide examples of how other peoples computing experience might not match your own. > Okay so after all that we get to the root of the issue. Instead of a good traditional desktop experience, you want to provide a mediocre desktop/touch hybrid experience. Instead of doing one thing well, the aim is to do multiple things poorly. No need to get disparaging here. Clearly we don't want to provide a "mediocre" experience, nor do I think we do. I also don't agree that supporting touch is some sort of hybrid experience these days. We aren't trying to be a mobile platform. We aren't trying to be a phone platform. Peoples traditional desktops (including many home workstations) have touch. These are real desktops bought by real people who get real work done.
    - rootlocus 10y ago
      I work with a lot of people who have desktops. I have two. I haven't seen anyone use a traditional desktop with touch. No one. Not once. My girlfriend is a 2d artist and she uses a wacom tablet for digital painting in photoshop. That's it. I always disliked the huge buttons that come by default with some desktop environments, and I'm amazed the argument is "people use touch". As far as I and everyone around me is concerned, no they don't. If it's an accessibility issue, it should be an optional solution for those who need it, not the default.
  - jscholes 10y ago

audidude 10y ago

> Usually when there are accessibility issues you add options to deal with that, you don't change everything for a relatively tiny percentage of your user base. Would you make all your widgets have max contrast and double the font size by default because it improves accessibility for the visually impaired? There are way more types of impairments than visually impaired. We do have high contrast themes to help with a subset of visual impairment. (Even visual impairment is a wide-spectrum). Many of us may not particularly like touch screens, but an incredible number of computers that run Linux/BSD these days have touch screens. Things should work out of the box for these computers whether or not you want one. So we can make arbitrary guesses at what the "majority" is but the reality is we have a lot of hardware that we should support. Getting real statistics about users in F/OSS is difficult due to the high overlap of people interested in personal privacy. So we try to make as informed of decisions as we can. Additionally, more computer users than you might image have various difficulties in using the computer. Even if its not a majority, say one in ten, is still a large number of users. Count yourself lucky that you don't have an impairment (right now). It is common that people have an impairment at some point in time (RSI, broken arm, etc). I certainly agree that HiDPI is often way too large today (again due to the need for compositor integration), and I also agree we should have a condensed mode. However, I'd probably argue to implement a condensed mode on top of an effective 1.5x scaling (3/2) rather than yet another option in the toolkit/themes.

twotavol 10y ago
Why are you lecturing me on visual impairment and disabilities? At no point did I claim you ignore that user base. >Many of us may not particularly like touch screens, but an incredible number of computers that run Linux/BSD these days have touch screens. Things should work out of the box for these computers whether or not you want one. Okay so after all that we get to the root of the issue. Instead of a good traditional desktop experience, you want to provide a mediocre desktop/touch hybrid experience. Instead of doing one thing well, the aim is to do multiple things poorly.
- audidude 10y ago
  I am trying to not come off as lecturing. My apologies if it was interpreted as such. You were making claims and I'm simply trying to provide examples of how other peoples computing experience might not match your own. > Okay so after all that we get to the root of the issue. Instead of a good traditional desktop experience, you want to provide a mediocre desktop/touch hybrid experience. Instead of doing one thing well, the aim is to do multiple things poorly. No need to get disparaging here. Clearly we don't want to provide a "mediocre" experience, nor do I think we do. I also don't agree that supporting touch is some sort of hybrid experience these days. We aren't trying to be a mobile platform. We aren't trying to be a phone platform. Peoples traditional desktops (including many home workstations) have touch. These are real desktops bought by real people who get real work done.
  - rootlocus 10y ago
    I work with a lot of people who have desktops. I have two. I haven't seen anyone use a traditional desktop with touch. No one. Not once. My girlfriend is a 2d artist and she uses a wacom tablet for digital painting in photoshop. That's it. I always disliked the huge buttons that come by default with some desktop environments, and I'm amazed the argument is "people use touch". As far as I and everyone around me is concerned, no they don't. If it's an accessibility issue, it should be an optional solution for those who need it, not the default.
- jscholes 10y ago