Change autohide panel default settings ?

[Ric Flomag]

Hi all,

This bug classified as "wishlist" draw mi attention as i was looking for 
a way to configure my Gnome panel:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-panel/+bug/217985

As Greg Grossmeier <https://bugs.launchpad.net/%7Egreg.grossmeier> 
suggested on the last comment, i'm posting here to discuss the matter of 
autohide panel default settings, which imho could be much better.

I suggest 3 change to the default gconf settings:

  * The unhide_delay is way too slow. For the sake of responsiveness, it 
should be immediate. I suggest a delay of 0.

  * Even when unhide_delay is set to 0, the rather slow speed of the 
animation effect (about 0.5s) still makes it rather unresponsive. I 
suggest to set enable_animation to 0, unless it is possible to speed it 
up (not in gconf apparently).

   * The auto_hide_size default of 6 pixels gives the impression that 
the panel is stuck half way on its move out of the screen. A small part 
of the applets and icons are still visible, but unrecognizable. IMO the 
expected behavior of an autohide feature is that the panel completely 
disappears, or only draws a line on the border of the screen. My 
suggestion: 0px or 1px. (which actually behave the same, the panel does 
not completely hide when set to 0)


Rationale:

 * Before: Ric wants to configure his desktop so the panels auto hide. 
He selects the "Hide automatically" option. Unfortunately, the 
half-hidden panel looks weird, and there is a unbearable delay when he 
wants to click on the main menu or unminimize a window from the windows 
list. He deactivates autohide. 3 years later he discovers by chance that 
he could configure autohide with gconf.

  * After: Ric2 wants to configure his desktop so the panels auto hide. 
He selects the "Hide automatically" option and feels more productive 
ever after.