Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

but from a style pov, it seems to be a winner...

and when i try to drag with my finger on the N800 screen i can see why...

thing is that when one use a finger to apply pressure to a screen, it also creates resistance between the surface of the finger and the surface of the screen.

but with a capacitive touch screen, one only have to hold the finger near to have it react. therefor its easier to drag things along on the screen.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

but who would want to to this with fingers? there's a reason why iphone-users buy high-priced stylus-replacements that work with capacitive touch screens.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

Interesting discussion here. The touchscreen question is a really important one. Capacitive touchscreens have certain benefits, for instance they allow multitouch usage whereas resistive do not. (As well as the overall finger usage experience is better.)

Please take the following as hypothetical input: if a platform would be considering moving for instance towards multitouch usage, this then would mean moving towards capacitive screens, which then means that it doesn't make much sense continue developing a dual stylus/finger touch UI style. (That would make no sense, actually - styluses simply stop working.) It's a -lot- of work to do, increasing design and implementation effort.

By designing for one input mechanism designs can be optimized for that input. It's a rather fundamental question, affecting widget design, application UI's, how much information can you fit on screen at any one time etc. etc.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

that they are buying these would be news to me...

as for doing it with finger vs stylus. i think the common claim is that a finger is always available ;)

btw, i am of that opinion that a finger friendly ui will always be stylus and even mouse friendly, but that a stylus or mouse friendly ui may not always be finger friendly...

and yes, i find myself using a finger on the N800 as often as i use a stylus for small stuff like finding a bookmark to open.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

See? That's what talking to other people is good for. I know 2 jesusPhone-users, both decided to go stylus after a while.

as is the thing that waits for you in the upper right corner of your tablet.

the point is that on such a small screen (and is is small compared to desktop PCs, not to other mobile devices of course) screen estate is the most valuable thing you have. "finger-friendly" UI-elements have to be big and therefore waste a lot of this valuable space, which drives me nuts. Why doesn't the RSS reader applet show me more headlines in its small box? Oh, because it's "finger friendly", so headlines need to take at least the space of the fattest thumb, no matter how short they are. Why can't I read the full subject of the emails in the inbox? Oh, because the UI is "finger friendly" and therefore we need a scroolbar you can play soccer in. It's just absurd for such a small device.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

silly question, but do they happen to be old school smartphone users?

yep, but there is that extra moment to remove that from the holder. i also find myself with a lack of precision when applying pressure to the screen for those long-taps (or for that matter, double-taps). but then i was never that good with pencils or pens anyways. my handwriting is a complete mess for instance.

the rss applet i never bothered with, nor with the mail applet or similar. but then i dont have either of those set for automatic checking of new items. i use those kinds of features on my desktop computer, but i never felt the need for it on a handheld. but then i pay by the data amount if im using tethering so...

on the rss there another reason also, it keeps reseting where im at in the feed when the check interval comes around.

what i have sitting on my desktop are homeip, homefreespace and personal-launcher. the clock i have in the statusbar thanks to statusbarclock (not the large one btw).

i also use echowb so that using scrollbars with a finger is easy.

oh, and i use personal-menu in place of the default contacts/mail icon on the sidebar.

and maybe i should add that i use advanced backlight control so that i can use the dpad to adjust sound and light level ;)

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

;) not that I would know. I doubt it, though, as they both don't have use for any smartphone functionality. They're just Apple-subscribers, the buy everything (literally!) the dark lord throws on the market. (I know for sure one of them has every single ipod model ever released by Apple. The other one has some, although I'm not sure if he got all of them.)

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

What you say is critically important. Important in the sense that the fact that people prefer different things must not be hidden under the carpet, it must be accepted up front.

The GREAT thing about X11 compared to MS Windows is that X11 gives you choice, you can find whatever UI that fits how you want to use it, while Windows is (mainly) about one-size-fits-all. The NITs have Linux/X11 under the hood, and this should leveraged to give the individual user easy options to set up the environment the way that user wants it. As it is, I'm not even allowed to extend the status bar to make room for all the status bar icons I'm using, and I can't shrink the 'Google' search bar to something not wasting half the screen. Just to begin with.

Some like large icons and few items in a menu, and they enjoy squashing a fat finger on that icon. Others shudder by the thought (as you may understand I'm one of them.. ;) - if I must use a finger I use a nail.) There's IMO nothing stopping the powers-that-be from incorporating flexibility into the GUI design, it's currently extremely rigid and this is totally counter to how X11 GUIs traditionally work.

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

It was removed because, although a nice idea, ISTR it was found to be unreliable and frustrating for many people (I accept it may have always worked perfectly for you).

Perhaps the N900 will introduce a touchscreen where this becomes a reality (perhaps a capacitive screen supporting finger and supplied stylus, with the ability to distinguish them).

However it's done, supporting two modes simply costs more money. This means something else won't be done in supporting a dual-mode UI. Therefore, I support a wholly finger-based UI - it just needs to be much better implemented :-)

Re: can the '08 GUI be ANY crappier?
 

or they could go for something like the dual mode screens that one find on tablet pc's...