
Fluid windows - bpierre
http://toki-woki.net/lab/fluid-corners/
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jjcm
I work for Microsoft as a UX prototyper. This is actually not only cool, but
useful. I'll forward this around internally.

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samstave
Separate question;

Why can I have multiple documents open in any MS Office App, which allow me to
show one document on one screen and another on a different screen -- EXCEPT
Excel?

This drives me NUTS. I can't easily compare data between spreadsheets without
stretching the app across both screens -- then manually adjusting each
document window within excel.

Who the hell is responsible for these inconsistencies over there?

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pkamb
Right-Click on Excel Taskbar Icon > "Microsoft Excel" > A new window opens.

Still crazy that it doesn't do that by default, but there is a workaround.

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murrayb
> Right-Click on Excel Taskbar Icon > "Microsoft Excel" > A new window opens.

Is that a windows 7 feature? It doesn't appear to work for XP. (Yeah yeah this
desktop is in a govt dept that will get updated one day...)

Like the samstave this (mis)feature of Excel has been frustrating me forever.

~~~
PhilRae
Can't remember what the shortcut is (been on the mac bandwagon for 5 years)
but it definitely works in XP as I was doing that for years. Maybe File > New
Window or something like that.

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brianpan
This is a very cool idea and I definitely see the problem that it solves, but
it also has the downside of not being a metaphor for something physical.

It's a little strange to see these controls which are currently very anchored
in the corner of the window to be moving and sliding around, especially when
the view inside the window is scrolling off the screen.

I could see people running into trouble when they've somehow moved the window
partially obscuring controls. But if the controls are off the screen, I think
it reinforces the idea that this "box" is a window into an application. It
doesn't resize unless you grab an edge. (1) I don't mind making the tradeoff
towards beginners understanding the computer when there are keyboard shortcuts
for advanced users.

(1) This is now worse in OS X from a metaphor perspective. Before you could
only resize from the bottom-right where there was a gripper. Now you can
resize from any outside edge and there are no grippers/indicators.
[http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-
os-x-10-7.a...](http://arstechnica.com/apple/reviews/2011/07/mac-
os-x-10-7.ars/4)

~~~
samstave
> _...but it also has the downside of not being a metaphor for something
> physical._

Sometimes though we need it to be a metaphor for what we _intend or imply_

Rather than simply mirroring physical constraints in an unconstrained
environment.

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lubutu
The Haiku window manager does exactly this, but it also resizes the viewport
such that the scrollbars are always visible. I've always thought it would be a
great feature in other stacking window managers.

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DHowett
The BeOS (and therefore Haiku) window managers were well beyond their time.
The tab style is still my favourite windowing paradigm.

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samstave
Seriously, everything should have tabs.

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Jach
Everything does have tabs. All your windows are just tabs on the task bar!

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Jach
I'm not a fan, also I don't like the name--I was expecting something like
Wobbly Windows, but more fluid-y instead of rubbery. (Someone should at least
edit the HN title to the original title of Fluid Corners.)

For the Windows version, dragging it pretty far to the right leaves
essentially just the close button group left. So what if I want to drag it
back? I'm incredibly more likely to accidentally click one of those buttons
instead of correctly grab the tiny sliver of space to redrag. (Because when I
drag things off-screen, I usually bring them back eventually, not to close
them, but to use them.) This seems like a solution ot a non-problem. Do most
people really close/minimize/maximize windows immediately after dragging them
back fully on-screen?

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georgemcbay
This would be awesome though on Windows (don't have much experience
programming Mac UI, so maybe there too) it would break programs that make
assumptions about how the non-client area of a window operates.

Quite a few programs do custom rendering up there in a way that would make it
difficult to retrofit this in a universally compatible way. These programs
would at a minimum need to get events to know that the various elements have
moved which would require code changes in the programs to listen for and react
to those events. Given how much Microsoft bends over backwards to maintain
Win32 compatibility (less than in the past, but still far more than average),
I doubt they'd put something like this in unless it was a wholesale interface
change (similar to Metro... which avoids this issue altogether by just not
having title bars).

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nknight
The habit of Windows apps to have entirely custom UIs is relatively unknown on
Macs. It's not impossible, just (thankfully) much more rare.

~~~
statictype
_The habit of Windows apps to have entirely custom UIs is relatively unknown
on Macs_

Except for all the apps that do. Like iTunes (ships with OS X) and the Mac App
Store app (ships with OS X). And Quicktime (ships with OS X).

Even some popular non-Apple apps like Twitter.

~~~
nknight
Er, those are _not_ entirely custom UIs, they use standard widgets in well-
defined ways that the platform/window manager understands.

~~~
statictype
The question was about the title bar chrome. iTunes positions the traffic
light buttons vertically when compact. The Mac App Store app positions them in
the center of the title area instead of the top. Quicktime has its own chrome
entirely. I'm not complaining about it, just pointing out that non-standard
chromes are present on the Mac in Apple's own apps.

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dgeb
I approve! One of the most annoying aspects of OS X (pre-Lion) was hunting for
the lower right corner to resize windows. Thankfully, all sides of a window
can now be used for resizing. This is a good vision for extending ease-of-
resizing further.

It would also force the priority of responsive design. Now that we all work at
so many different resolutions, apps and sites should adapt seamlessly to
resizing.

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tcarnell
I am amazed at how poorly modern keyboards support our highly visual modern
user interfaces. Wouldn't the following keyboard buttons be generally REALLY
useful:

\- Open

\- Close/Exit

\- Save

\- Copy

\- Paste

\- Menu (to list available context options)

\- Help (to show context help)

\- Maximize/Restore (toggle mode)

\- Info

And the potentially very useful directional arrows keys are almost completely
useless except when editing text (although game developers use them
meaningfully)

The keyboard is also littered with buttons whose function are designed
specifically for text editing, not necesarily a bad thing, but when was the
last time anybody actually reviewed the efficiency of the modern keyboard to
discover if it is doing a good job or not!?!?!

~~~
lusr
I always wondered this too. But I have a keyboard with these buttons (really
just the Fn keys and an "alternative Fn" function lock key that sends the
appropriate shortcuts to Windows) and I never use them. As a touch typist I
find it too much of a distraction to move my fingers off the home row and end
up sticking with the shortcuts. I'm not sure where else you could really put
them without the same problem occurring. Maybe its time to cut our alphabet
down to 19 letters and replace the bottom row of alphas with these functions.

~~~
tcarnell
I have also used keyboards that have extra buttons for things like this, but
somehow I have felt reluctant to make the effort to use them because they are
not standard and most other keyboards dont have them, which would frustrate me
more!

Who is in charge of keyboard standards? If there isn't anybody, could we start
a new keyboard layout organization!?!?

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francoisdevlin
Very, very cool. Would love to see this implemented somehow. Would save me
from lots of "mouse goofs"

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Derbasti
That is a great idea! Even greater would be to extend this to a consistent way
to manage windows whose title bar is above to upper screen edge.

Both Windows and Mac OS try pretty hard to avoid this, but with two monitors
it happens every now and then--especially when unpluggin/plugging the
secondary monitor.

Without the title bar, it can be really hard to get the window back on the
screen. Usually involves, if possible, resizing the window so it shows on both
screens or unplugging/re-plugging the secondary monitor.

~~~
prewett
I really miss Linux's Alt-drag to move a window, which would fix this problem.
I also wish MacOS and Windows actually let you move a window's titlebar
offscreen.

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staunch
FYI: Someone did alt-dragging (and resizing) for Windows
<http://code.google.com/p/altdrag/>

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mrschwabe
Quick, patent this!

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markokocic
You can't. This page would count as prior art.

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cookingrobot
Not prior art, but public disclosure.

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bajsejohannes
So what if I remake it before he patents it? Is my implementation then prior
art?

If you're right, the patent system is yet again more broken then I thought.

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prewett
No, he has 1 year from public disclosure to file for a patent (in the US, as
of 2006 when I took my IP law class [IANAL, btw]). You could not file for a
patent because his public disclosure would count as prior art for you, unless
you could prove that you had the idea before his publication.

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huhtenberg
I would rather have the button block simply jump to the other side of the
window (instead of being pushed there by the window edge). IMO your version is
just too fancy for the routine day-to-day use.

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mhd
I remember some X11 window manager that used BeOS like tabs doing something
similar (either one of the twm hacks/successors, or a wm that allowed you to
merge tabs)…

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dantheta
That might have been fluxbox (fluxbox.org), from the BlackBox family.

~~~
mhd
I would've thought it was something older like pwm…

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waxjar
I think the OS X version is a bit confusing, to be honest. There are too many
elements sliding around and resizing. The problem it aims to fix is also still
partially unsolved when the screen is dragged 'too far'
(<http://i.imgur.com/Q4Ktw.png>).

The Windows version isn't confusing at all though (in its current
implementation). I think this would be a really nice feature on Windows.

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jrockway
I solved this problem by not having window decorations and not allowing
windows to be partially off-screen.

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sbmassey
With the Mac, a lot of people (i.e. me) will have the Dock in the way when you
drag off screen: keeping the window buttons onscreen wouldn't help much, since
they'd be behind the Dock, and sliding the buttons to keep outside the Dock
area would probably be too weird-looking.

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ndcrandall
This is really cool and I'd love to use it! The one thing I'd like to see is
some more gap on the windows side when it is dragged all the way to the right.
With some gap I wouldn't click close or minimize when trying to move it back.
The mac has enough gap with the title.

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hmottestad
That is really smart. Though I don't think anyone is going to implement it
(except maybe gnome) because the world of UI is shifting to mobile, even if
the "desktop" computer will stay with us for many years to come. Had you
thought of this 10 years ago ;)

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zobzu
On most Linux WM buttons are left and right hehe.

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joejohnson
I keep accidentally losing the window by dragging past the bottom of the
"screen" and letting go.

~~~
georgemcbay
Windows 7 allows you to do something similar.

The window layout manager is smart enough not to let you push the window
totally off the screen, but if you grab a window and pull it down under the
taskbar (assuming the taskbar is in the default bottom position and does not
autohide) in Windows 7, you're somewhat boned because while the window is
still there, the taskbar's zorder makes it impossible to click on it to
recover it. You can fix this situation by unlocking the taskbar (if it is
locked) and moving it or by setting it to autohide, but neither of these
things is a particularly intuitive move for the average user, I'd guess.

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dmn001
Pressing alt-space, m followed by the arrow keys usually worked when I was
using XP.

On Windows 7 this is not an issue as the windows snap to the sides and top,
and if you drag towards the bottom of the screen there are several pixels on
the titlebar where you can only resize the window and not move it, it is
really difficult to lose a window by dragging it as shown on the website.

~~~
georgemcbay
It is an issue in Windows 7, at least with default settings. As mentioned in
the grantparent post, if you have a default taskbar setup (at the bottom, no
autohide) you can very easily drag a window below the taskbar (because the
taskbar is larger than the entire window titlebar), which might as well be off
the screen because the zorder of the taskbar is greater than that of the
window, so you can't interact with the window via the mouse until you move the
taskbar or set it to auto-hide.

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dmn001
I just tried with the taskbar on the bottom, and I could not drag the mouse
cursor below the top edge of the taskbar.

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georgemcbay
That's odd, because I've got 3 different Windows 7 installs here and every one
of them allows me to drag the mouse cursor below the top edge of the taskbar
while dragging a window.

I'm not suggesting you're wrong here, just that I've never seen the behavior
you're seeing and I use Windows 7 frequently. Perhaps you have some option set
that I do not.

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cookingrobot
You can only drag into the taskbar area if you have multiple monitors.

On a single monitor setup it captures the mouse and prevents this issue.

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georgemcbay
My setups are all multi-monitor so I guess that's the issue? Thanks for the
info.

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jakeonthemove
I don't see how this could be useful - why would I drag a window outside of
the viewable area?

If I do, it's probably because I want it easily accessible but not obstructing
other windows, so these buttons would make it harder to drag it back.

For multiple monitors - the controls are dragged to the other monitor as
well...

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jakeonthemove
I don't usually reply to myself, but when I do, I have a good reason :-). In
this case, can anyone tell me how this fluid window could be useful, instead
of just downvoting me? Thank you!

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kleiba
It doesn't work for me, what is supposed to happen?

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sa1f
Here's a quick and dirty screencast <http://screenr.com/QrB8> Basically, parts
of the UI that would be hidden when the window is off-screen, get moved
inwards.

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rplnt
I was thinking it doesn't work for me but it does. I was just moving the
windows too fast to notice. It's great how unobtrusive it is.

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tcarnell
great!

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mariusmg
There are some little things called hotkeys........

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jasonkolb
Um, I have no idea if this is cool or not, because I'm sitting in a doctor's
office on my iPhone.

Is it really too much to ask to implement swipe gestures in JavaScript? The
world is mobile now. Whether this is actually cool or not I shall never know,
it has disqualified itself from my web browsing time.

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zackzackzack
The idea itself isn't meant for a mobile environment. The GUI moves when you
drag the windows around. This sort of interaction doesn't really play nice
with mobile usage.

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milkmiruku
Slight pipedream aside; a tiling window manager with multiple real and virtual
desktops plus gesture control would be nice. Anon or authed zeroconf wireless
networking and would allow one to place/dock a mobile device to the side of
your desktop/tv/other mobile and drag/sync apps and/or items between the two.
Anyone know of a system or so that could do the likes of that?

