5 ms·
They're naive, non-professional, obviously from a different time, not too distracting and there's a strange proportion of people who can't help but point out th
by dmos62 8y ago
They're naive, non-professional, obviously from a different time, not too distracting and there's a strange proportion of people who can't help but point out that they don't like it. What else could you want?
To go off on a parallel topic for a bit, I haven't used a desktop or a wallpaper for some years now and it's great. Both are a bad idea. The desktop is a magnet for sloppy organization. You'd be surprised just how much more organized and productive file system and shortcut usage gets if you turn off desktop icons. And a wallpaper is just distracting. I've never found a wallpaper that I didn't want to change after a while. I even tried minimal gradients. What ended up working perfect, as in I'll likely never change it, is a solid black wallpaper.
Concerning not using a wallpaper, functional benefits aside, someone might think that this would take away the bling of an expensive laptop, but that's exactly what I find appealing about it. This way you're treating the device, not as a status or fashion statement, but as a functional tool.
- Klover 8y agoI personally like desktop icons because it’s a tool. It’s my working directory, where I put files and order and stack them. Disks are shown there, as they too are temporary things that I currently do things with. Like a real desktop! Maybe I should just mount the desktop folder in RAM. I do agree with the solid colour as background. The working files are my markup. I’d suggest maybe using #808080 instead, or a colour like I do. Just a bit more pleasant in my experience.
- lkdjjdjjjdskjd 8y agoI rarely ever see my desktop, because apps are usually maximized. Doesn't everybody do that? What kind of apps did people use back in the day when desktops weren't hidden all the time? Maybe the idea was to occasionally quit apps and open other ones, not to keep them all open at the same time?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- sovande 8y ago> What kind of apps did people use back in the day when desktops weren't hidden all the time? Emacs to the left and one xterm window in the bottom right corner.
- FlyMoreRockets 8y ago... with xclock top center.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- misterdoubt 8y agoWell with your live stats and feed plugin running transparently over the desktop and Winamp taking up non-rectangular space, it was critical to consider a desktop peeking through.
- mmphosis 8y agoZoomed, not maximized. Windows are sized only as large as they need to be. You can drag and drop between windows/apps, for example dragging to the trash can on the desktop. I think full screen is excellent for a few consumer apps like presentation/slide show, watching shows/movies and playing games. It's definitely a preference as I don't like tabs/MDI, snapping windows, and windows that consume screen space.
- dmos62 8y agoNot sure about back in the day, but what I use is one or more terminal windows at 80 chars width, so that's rarely more than 50% of the screen. I regularly use only one large app, the browser, but I don't keep it maximized if I don't need it, because then it's just visual noise. Sometimes I'll find myself feeling cluttered and confused while working, and I'll minimize or close everything, and reopen only the stuff I need at that time, and a feeling of ease will wash over, a bit like exhaling after holding your breath. I'm coming off peculiarly sensitive to distraction, because it's true. I wouldn't say I'm ADD, but I'd definitely say that as far as I can tell the casual stimuli bombardmant affects me more than most people I encounter. At the same time, I think that these days everyone is susceptible to sensory overexcitation.
- michaelcampbell 8y ago> Both are a bad idea AKA, "I don't like it."
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- anoncake 8y ago> You'd be surprised just how much more organized and productive file system and shortcut usage gets if you turn off desktop icons. The hundreds of files in my ~ strongly disagree.
- ghostly_s 8y agoYikes! I can't imagine ever saving something directly to ~.
- the_jeremy 8y agoHow about the 30 or so applications I have that save to ~/.something?
- jason_slack 8y agoActually I put a lot of statically linked apps on ~/Applications. This way if I need to move machines most of what I need is in ~ along with my data and config.
- ghostly_s 8y agoWell, I meant anything not starting with a dot. ;) Things I am saving I generally want to be able to see. But I wish all that crap would keep itself to .config where it belongs too, and I do what I can to keep those who can't play nicely in the sandbox off my system.
- zapzupnz 8y agoFor me, a pure black background is the enemy; because macOS doesn't have window borders, only shadows, it's necessary to have some contrast to differentiate between the edges of windows with dark content or dark-themed windows and the background. In that case, a good wallpaper is just as functional as a plain background, if not more; I usually pick my wallpapers based on contrast with my typically-displayed windows and the usual colours of their content. Besides which, functionality and aesthetics aren't mutually exclusive.
- knolax 8y agoI usually only ever see a sliver of my wallpaper in between the gaps of my i3-gaps windows. I think at this point it's less of a wallpaper and more of a texture for my window borders.
- jdlyga 8y agoI had desktop icons off for a while too. And I found myself a lot more productive with organized folders on my desktop. It's much nicer to lay things out spatially than in a flat list in your home folder.