"Spatial" mode?

[Wander Boessenkool]

On Thu, 2004-12-23 at 18:18 -0500, Eric Dunbar wrote:
<snip class="Spatial vs Browser discussion" />
> The fact that Apple _INTRODUCED_ it into OS X, after 15 years of not
> having it is a testament to the effectiveness of the "browser" mode

Or of the effectiveness of their marketing dept. And the need to attract
users who are used to a certain form of GUI-misbehaviour from Redmond.

> (looking inside the book in the drawer in the desk, and not taking the
> book out of the drawer out of the desk). But, for a new user (and for
> old dogs alike - there are times that I go to "spatial" browsing
> because I *want* to leave a trail of open windows) the "spatial" mode
> of removing the drawer from the desk is conceptually a much easier
> concept to grasp! Being able to switch between the modes at the drop
> of the hat is important since each of the modes have advantages (if

I agree, for some people the browser-mode works beter, but I believe
that for most people spatial is the way to go. A typical user does *not*
want to know *anything* about his/her filesystem (who cares that the
path to a file is /home/joe_average_user/Desktop/photo.jpg, it's right
there on his desktop! It even shows a miniature of the photo!). He/she
has a couple of folders that get used daily, and some more that are used
less often. Just putting them in the homedir, on the desktop, or in a
random place and symlinking them to one or more logical locations means
that a user can find files easily. Especially since the folders will
open where they were before, with even the scrollbar positioned exactly
where they left it. Throw in some fancy session-management and their
desktop will behave as a tangible thing. Without even the need to draw
an analogy, or come up with a new one. Most people will feel at home in
no time.

> Nautilus wants to copy someone who's done it right (Nautilus hasn't

Hm, I don't think the goal of nautilus is to copy someone who has done
it right. The goal is, or should be in my opinion, to incorporate all
the handy features like drag-n-drop (Windows(tm) made many people think
dnd is a bad thing. Incorporated right, like in Nautilus, GTK, Gnome,
KDE, etc.. it's actually a very, very powerful feature)

> yet) look at Apple (I haven't played with XP enough to know its layout
> like the back of my hand so I don't know if MS has improved file

Believe me, they haven't.

And a tip for everybody who prefers spatial, but occasionally
needs/wants browser:

create a launcher that executes 'nautilus --browser', launch it and
voila: instant browser-mode nautilus without having to change a single
setting


> management).

-- 
BOFH excuse #304:

routing problems on the neural net
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