[hoary] initial usability reactions

[Daniel Robitaille]

> While I wouldn't suggest that all users do (or should) use the desktop,
> it's going a bit far to say it's "much better in the long run." Why is
> it better? If you don't want to use the icons, you don't have to; if
> you do, they're there for your use, as well as anything else you want
> to dump on the desktop (and the icons help let you know you _can_ dump
> things on the desktop). And there is actual evidence (aside from the
> "my friend does it" variety) that users use their desktops for
> short-term storage of things. 

maybe it's naive  of my part, and like you said earlier, I'm really
not a newby at computers and graphical interfaces, but I think that
this decision to put icons or not on the desktop is up to the user, in
the same category than the colour of the background, the window theme,
etc. Ubuntu provides something neutral and simple  and it's up to the
user to add more as they wish, when they wish.

With that said maybe the example of KDE is a nice one: at least on KDE
3.1 on Mandrake, you have a setting, easily found in the desktop
background preferences,  to turn on and off icons on the desktop. 
Maybe in Ubuntu it could be on (or off) by default, and one right
click would give access to that setting. And everyone could switch
from one mode or the other very easily.