Re: a web-browser UI concept

[Camille Bourgoin]

On 2007-03-01 14:01:55 +0100 Graham J Lee <leeg@thaesofereode.info> wrote:

> On 1 Mar 2007, at 12:12, Camille Bourgoin wrote:
> 
>> Hello !
>> 
>> This morning, in my bath, I think of a user-interface concept for a
>> web-browser. I wrote a paper about it. Maybe is it bad, maybe it can
>> be useful for somebody.
>> 
>> 
>> The concept is in my website, here :
>> http://jbbourgoin.free.fr/site/index.php? 
>> option=com_content&task=view&id=38&Itemid=49
>> 
> 
> The toolbar separated from the document view is novel (OmniWeb <4.0  had the 
> bookmarks inspector as a separate window, but IIRC that was  it).  OTOH, how 
> much sense does that make?  For things like zoom,  help etc. it's fine.  But 
> buttons like forward, back, history act _on  a document_ so separating them 
> from the document view seems off to  me.  Of course, your kilometrage may 
> vary.
> Not a specific comment about your own design but I find it hard to  marry the 
> concept of tabbed browsers with a document-based  design...document-based 
> apps should have one (or more) windows per  document, whereas tabs gives you 
> one or more documents per window.

Yes. You are right.

> On the other hand, people tend to view 
> web pages at something close  to the full size of their screen so a suitably 
> flexible tab system  (like OmniWeb 5.x) can be a benefit to screen-space 
> organisation.

You are right. Today tabs are necessery. Maybe the concept of file (au
sens de "classeur", je ne sais pas si le terme "file" traduit très
bien cette idée) can combine the tab and the document-oriented app
... A "file" (un classeur) is not a document. It's a space (a window)
who gather document together. This is the reason why :

1) the toolbar is separated from the document window. When you gather
two documents together and the toolbar is integrated with the document
: two toolbars (two window) became one toolbar => two documents became
one document. This is an application oriented application.

With the model in my mind (not very useful, I know ;) ) the document
who are gather with another one, is just "behind" the other document.

2) this is the reason why the Edit action act only on the document
who are selected. When you click on another document (even if it is
gather with it), you return to the navigation mode. Go back to the
edited document, and you are in edition mode etc. I don't know if it
is possible :(

3) back and forward are seperated from documents because they are
your hands who turn the pages. And we haven't 10 hands ;)

Thank you for your comments ! They are very very interesting.

I hope my franchglish is understandable !


>> The article is in french, but the sketches are in english (I'm not
>> very good in english, sorry :( )
>> 
> 
> Nous sommes une bonne équipe, parce que je ne comprends pas un mot de  
> français ;-).
> 

Ce projet serait-il un refuge de francophone ??  Encore merci pour
toutes tes remarques. J'espère y avoir répondues correctement.


Salut


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Vénération : L'attitude spirituelle d'un homme envers un dieu, et d'un
             chien envers un homme.
        -+- Ambrose Bierce -+-