Some 4.1.90 usability thoughts

[purslow at sympatico.ca]

041013 Jasper Huijsmans wrote:
> Jeff Franks wrote:
>> 1. It would be user friendly for left handed people to be able
>> to add the pager the to left side of the task bar instead of the right.
>> I'm left handed and I hold the mouse with my left hand.
>> More often than not the mouse cursor comes to a rest on the left side
>> of the screen (the opposite to right handed people).
>> It is a lot easier and more comfortable for a left handed person
>> to move the cursor up the screen to the left side of the task
>> rather than diagonally across the screen to the opposite corner.
> Interesting, Im right-handed, but have my mouse on the left (RSI),
> but I never thought of that ;) Guess I'm so addicted to scrolling
> on the desktop to switch workspaces, I never use the pager.

same here & i keep the mouse buttons in 'right-hand' mode,
which puts almost no strain on hand & wrist.

>> The Iconbox functions similarly to the task bar and would offer users
>> a different desktop experience if they could optionally add the Iconbox
>> to the panel as a plugin, and optionally hide the taskbar.
>> Some people like to (or need to) maximize screen real estate
>> for the application(s) they use
> To be honest the icon box is more or less unmaintained
> and should be replaced with something based on the netk_tasklist functions.

hmm, i really hope that wb a behind-the-scenes software reorganisation,
not an in-your-face visible desktop replacement (smile):
the iconbox is one of the best features of Xfce (and no taskbar).

i save screen space (on my 15-inch monitor) by putting the panel at left
-- also app toolbars where possible -- with iconbox at top left.
there are some screenshots at  http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~purslow/ ,
esp  xfree-konqueror.png , which also shows the left-side toolbar.

one of the great things re Xfce is that users can configure it to taste.

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