Xfce Development - Suggestions

[raz0 at tiscali.dk]

Hi,

I am a Xfce user since 4.0 and have enjoyed using it so far. I do, however,
have a few suggestions to make even Xfce better. I don't know if this has
been mentioned before, and this might just be a totally inappropriate place
to ask it. If it is though, I apologise.

The current release of Xfce (4.2.x) has three kinds of bars.

a) The panel on which you can load all sorts of plugins.
b) The taskbar which shows running programs.
c) The iconbox; same as the taskbar but with another look.

According to http://blog.xfce.org/index.php?p=93, you are already working
on collapsing these three units into one unified and flexible bar. This
is great since it is a step towards what I've wanted to suggest for quite
some time now.

You see, back when I was still using Windows exclusively I used a shell
called Geoshell [geoshell.org]. It builds on the principle of so-called
Geobars, quite similar to what the panel is now actually. Instead of the
limitation of just one bar (or panel) you could load as many bars as you
felt like and stuff them with all sorts of great plugins. These bars were
both skinable and highly customizable. You could also customize them both
individually and globally. Unfortunately Geoshell built on an old and buggy
codebase, so there were *some* limitations.

Now that I've switched to linux I naturally chose Xfce since it's goals
are close are quite similar to the goals of Geoshell; namely minimalism
and sort-of bars. :) For a better explanation take a look at http://www.k23productions.com/eggshell/
- Eggshell is also a Windows shell, though I don't think that it's been
a released yet. The page sums up quite well what I think Xfce should be
moving towards though. All of this is in my humble oppinion of course. :)

Best regards,
Morten Bojsen-Hansen