Proposal by Juan Canham

Design Proposal [linked sections]

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The following design proposal is part of the collection of design proposals for “Accessing Functionality”, which is part of Project Renaissance.

Summary and Status

Instead of providing a fixed layout, providing a framework to allow users to setup a wide variety of setups to suit thier needs. Additionally the most popular setups can then be shipped with openoffice to work around the fact that different use cases use different setups (e.g a person who mainly reads documents doesn't want much screen estate wasted on toolbars, but a user who mainly formats will need his tools visable most of the time)

Status: WIP.. only read about the project today, is the deadline GMT?

After you consider the comments and questions in the comments section, revise your proposal for completeness and understandability. When you feel your proposal is ready for evaluation, please change the status above to “Proposal Complete”.

Mockup

Please add your main “wireframe” mockup. For example: A mockup which shows the functionality for adding a slide in Impress.

Detailed Description

• Menubar: Replace the main menubar with a menubutton, use this to show all menu items buttons that aren't shown by menu buttons that are spread on the toolbar as individual items (provide buttons for all menu items but only include some by default)
• Permanent toolbar, some actions can be done from any situation (copy/paste/undo,etc) these items should be placed on a permanent toolbar
• Bind keys,buttons, changes of to toggle whats in the "container"

• Make the whole thing customizable (if the relevant buttons are to big to fit in the provided space that section should be the first to lose space) and allow users to define their own "containers" (allow repeated buttons) and their own triggers to put these into the "container"
• If possible make all the toolbar separately themable (is this a toolkit limitation?)
• Allow the different sections to be separated (like current toolbars)
• Allow different toolbars to use different sized icons (and some to include text while other dont)
• Providing too much customization is not a bad thing as long as most people can use the defaults.

• Provide an easy&safe way to save/share a "theme" (There is no point in doing research designing what you thing is a good compromise for the work load that office/home users put their suite through, when you can just put a version out there and see what people do with it )

• Describe dynamic behavior: When the set of icons in the container is changed, via toggle buttons, keyboard shortcut or selection of a different media, a transformation takes place (fade out one set and fade in another seams like a logical transition but its not overly important)
• Explain the rationale and assumptions: I like to have (with few exceptions) all my buttons on a single row, however as soon you try and apply this to a toolbar with big icons, its soon apparent that my ideas will not work for everybody. I assume that while many people want a minimalist UI, other want a much bigger UI and the only way to keep both groups happy is to make it easy to use either setup
• Highlight particular design ideas and alternatives:The replacing of the menubar with a single button is a bold move, and its very important for an application to fit in with an OS, while i think including a menubar button is a good idea accross all OSs, it may be appropriate to not enable it by default on macs .
• List issues and open questions: Please list any issues you are aware of and open questions. Do not worry if your proposal or concept isn't perfect. If you have discovered any stumbling blocks or worries, then please provide this information right from the start. Maybe the team can help find answers/solutions.

Comments

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Your space :-)