New style of desktop!

[Nordin Ingenieur]

Hello guys,

I was thinking why Apple with their Mac and Microsoft with their Windows are
often ahead when it comes to design, usability etc...
I know Linux has proven itself as a stable OS, but it is still way behind
the commercial ones. For example, a year ago my brother wanted to install
Ubuntu on his pc, but he wasn't able to get his wireless networkcard
working. A bigger problem is, my brother is a webdesigner and usability
consultant, but he wasn't able to get his networkcard working. So not even
to mention about people who has a little knowledge of computers and
internet.

Why aren't we still able to get "simple" things done on Linux. Most users
are not skilled enough to solve problems on Linux, so Linux (say GNULinux)
should be as userfriendly as possible. Just like Android for mobilephones,
they focused so much on the usablility and try to get the system very
userfriendly. That way of thinking we should do that too.

We don't want to follow the hype of Windows or OS X, we want them follow
Linux. Linux should come with briliant ideas first, so we can get more
attention from the media and so people are more interested.

So I thought about changing the style we use desktops nowadays. Instead of
clicking the Application menu or System menu or others, I thought by
clicking the middle button of the mouse or the left and the right button
together of the mouse a menu pops up. The menu looks like the menu we see in
most mobilephones, like an Ericsson K700. The first appearance contains
Application, Settings, Administration, Next etc... Next to the menu we have
something like a list which contains recent started applications, recent
documents etc.... But if we select for example the Application button, we
than get several applications, if there is to many apps, we'll find also the
next button scrol for more. The list next to it will change too and shows
recent things, or other handy stuff, to start things quicker.

We can give it a very cool style like 3D and some eyecandy look of the menu,
making it a bit transparent etc... I hope to have some drawing examples this
weeken to show you so you get an idea of it. What can we reach with that? At
least it's very userfriendly, I mean the concept is from the mobilephone
menu, which can be easily understood and used by just a simple primitive
mini joystick. So even people who never used a computer before, can simply
use this style to work with Linux. Another thing is, you don't have to move
a lot with the mouse. Just stay in the middel of the screen. But what about
multi-touchscreen supported Linux? Even farmers with thick fingers will work
very well and very easy if he used a mobile before. You do that cool moves
with you finger to move the menu to the next, while the menu is moving like
a cubus (like Compiz Fusion style, but much smaller ofcourse).

So the idea is, if people don't have difficulties with using a mobilephone
menu, than Linux won't be difficult too!
I have no experience in programming such a menu on Desktop level and that's
because I don't have time for it. So I hope you like this idea and so you
might consider to start a project to develop.

What do you think about it?
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