__/ [TheLetterK] on Sunday 12 February 2006 19:19 \__
> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>> __/ [B Gruff] on Sunday 12 February 2006 13:02 \__
>>
>>> On Sunday 12 February 2006 09:07 Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>>>
>>>> http://www.hardmac.com/news/2006-02-10/#5115
>>>>
>>>> When Linux gets inspired by Mac OS X - Yoc - 02:43:28
>>>>
>>>> "...But the biggest surprise is the new graphic interface which uses
>>>> OpenGL to create effects which you are all too familiar with, like
>>>> window transparency, switching desktops using a large rotating cube, or
>>>> creating a thumbnail view of a window."
>>>>
>>>> Videos included as well. I can't say I agree with the article (e.g.
>>>> http://freshmeat.net/projects/3ddesktop/ predates it), but it's worth a
>>>> read. It's very short too.
>>> Looks good, but are you sure that we should be watching them?
>>> Problem is, I use SUSE, and according to some (was it tab and Bailo?) in
>>> this group, I can't do that, can I? Should I admit to having seen them
>>> or not, Uncle Roy?
>>>
>>> Confused (U.K.)
>>
>> I was thinking the same thing over breakfast, but Novell have a commitment
>> to keeping their SuSE-related projects open to the public. xgl support and
>> the rest of the eye candy must propagate onto SuSE and OpenSuSE in due
>> time. It is rather easy once code and rigorous testing have been put in.
>>
>> That said, I already get all of these goodies apart from the revolving
>> cube, which I find disturbing from a pragmatic point-of-view (3ddesktop
>> and metisse [1] would have the same impact). For example, when I wants to
>> move to Desktop 8 (KNode), for example, why would I choose to see an ani-
>> mation rather than have the region of interest appear within milliseconds?
>> You could argue that translucency plays a certain role and likewise thumb-
>> nail view, which has been available for ages (e.g. KasBar which is becom-
>> ing more consistent in terms of rendering). Certtain things have their
>> place only in demos [2].
>
> Well, you can adjust the speed it takes to make the transition, if it
> bothers you, but there is one overwhelming advantage to
> 3ddesktop--desktop browsing. If you're trying to juggle 10 windows, it's
> very helpful to see readable thumbnails of all of them arranged so you
> can see the content. The cube animation is sort of useless, but some of
> the carousel animations are very helpful. There's nothing keeping you
> from using traditional methods of desktop switching, it just adds
> another way to view them. Well, if it's using normal 3ddesktop.
I understand what you say, but for previews you already have kpager (or the
like), which has become quite flexible and sophisticated (GNOME is still
behind slightly). You can choose whether you want to see just an
applications map, a full picture with iconic applications or even
applications as pixmaps. Essentially, you have a good overview, which tells
you what foes on and where.
Sorry to cite my own URL again, but have a look at the bottom of <
http://schestowitz.com/introduction.htm >. This shows the pager in almost
real time. I am not using that computer at the moment, but you can get a
rough idea of that's running over there, as can I. I have the pager
displayed at the bottom-right (see above image) all the time, so what would
be the point of animating transitions? Shadow casting likewise. I have it
enabled at the moment and it only slows down interaction with the windows
(it devours CPU cycles really badly) while serving no practical benefit
other than flash. If the O/S was called Vista, that would perhaps be
justified.
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