top bar, menu bar, panel or top panel

[Jeremy Bicha]

On 10 July 2012 04:49, Hannie Dumoleyn <lafeber-dumoleyn2 at zonnet.nl> wrote:
> As a member of the ubuntu manual team I started a discussion on how we
> should call this "thing" at the top of our screen.
> As a translator of the official Ubuntu documentation (yelp) I noticed that
> the word "panel" had been changed to "menu bar" in the Precise version.
> I would like to discuss this with people from ubuntu-translators and
> ubuntu-docs as well.
> Let me know what you think.

The official Ubuntu term is "menu bar". Besides the official Ubuntu
documentation, this can be found in multiple places in System Settings
such as "Show battery status in the menu bar".

The GNOME documentation calls the similar space in GNOME Shell "top bar".

Personally, I like the "menu bar" name as the top of the screen
includes application menus, application status menus, and system
status menus. The only part that isn't a menu is the window management
buttons (close, minimize, maximize) and the app title.

Thanks for asking as clear and consistent word choices are important!

Jeremy