XP look-alike interface?

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Would you like to "keep with the times" by implementing an XP-style interface for ReactOS?

Yes
119
56%
No
92
44%
 
Total votes: 211

nick_emblow
Posts: 2
Joined: Tue Nov 08, 2005 10:56 am

luna look and feel.

Post by nick_emblow »

Perhaps the worst aspect of the luna look and feel is that if done properly, it is actuall visually appealing and quite usable.

I say this is the worste aspect because, there are patents on gradients, colours, fonts, probably even button order that ms could use to shut down ros.

I say make it usable, make it appealing, but dont use luna. (unfortunately).

Also - who is the target audience?

OEMs?
Consumers?
-sub categories:
highly experienced and capable pc users
"" developers
moderately " "" users/devel
very little experience pc users

If i were guessing ATM, IMO i would say - highly experienced and capable pc users. OEM's are out of the question as far as I can see, as ms no doubt has them by the family jewels. and moderate users usually dont care too much about theyre os, as long as they can "fiddle" with the themes etc.
very little experienced users often dont even know what an OS is, or if they paid for it, where it came from. ETC.

Perhaps targeting developers of great experience is a very good idea, as it will speed up the development of the project as more and more come on board. As a developer - most of the time, stability and speed are the main agenda, look is only an afterthought (ie moderate level users/devs are often more interested in look or at least on an equal basis with stability and speed)

Ease of development should be the highest priority until a major release candidate anyways (ie 1.0)

Perhaps an IDE - Eclipse or even better mono (.NET is the foundation of a lot of ms tech these days....)

Has anyone tried mono or eclipse on ros yet?
billyswong
Posts: 55
Joined: Tue Nov 29, 2005 7:20 pm
Location: Hong Kong, China

Post by billyswong »

An important category is missed: Gamers.

Performance become even more critical there. That's also why Linux+WINE will never cut it: emulated DirectX will never be as fast as a native one. But ReactOS will.
ThePhysicist
Developer
Posts: 509
Joined: Mon Apr 25, 2005 12:46 pm

Re: luna look and feel.

Post by ThePhysicist »

nick_emblow wrote: Perhaps targeting developers of great experience is a very good idea, as it will speed up the development of the project as more and more come on board. As a developer - most of the time, stability and speed are the main agenda, look is only an afterthought (ie moderate level users/devs are often more interested in look or at least on an equal basis with stability and speed)
I agree, but somebody (network administrator of a huge German company) told me that after working 8 hours on a PC, you will start to like the luna theme, because it's not only eyecandy, but it is more eye friendly for long time pc workers. I cannot jugde this, because I hate the bubblegum look and have turned it off. ;-)
TiKu
Posts: 157
Joined: Wed Jan 05, 2005 9:09 pm
Location: Unterföhring, Germany
Contact:

Re: luna look and feel.

Post by TiKu »

ThePhysicist wrote:I agree, but somebody (network administrator of a huge German company) told me that after working 8 hours on a PC, you will start to like the luna theme, because it's not only eyecandy, but it is more eye friendly for long time pc workers.
I totally agree on that. In the beginning I didn't like Luna, too. But I've changed my mind. The reason stands above.;)
StringCheesian
Posts: 31
Joined: Mon Mar 28, 2005 11:37 pm

Re: luna look and feel.

Post by StringCheesian »

TiKu wrote:
ThePhysicist wrote:I agree, but somebody (network administrator of a huge German company) told me that after working 8 hours on a PC, you will start to like the luna theme, because it's not only eyecandy, but it is more eye friendly for long time pc workers.
I totally agree on that. In the beginning I didn't like Luna, too. But I've changed my mind. The reason stands above.;)
Same here.
oiaohm
Posts: 1322
Joined: Sun Dec 12, 2004 8:40 am

Post by oiaohm »

An important category is missed: Gamers.

Performance become even more critical there. That's also why Linux+WINE will never cut it: emulated DirectX will never be as fast as a native one. But ReactOS will.
I have to state a little point of fact.

Number one Wines Direct X is not that slow. Average is 99.9% of real windows when NVidia or ATI opengl drivers are installed. Note that is a Average. Some games spike out up to 120% ie 20 percent faster than windows. And of course some games run slower.

Scarry part is that Wine is not optimsed yet and that is on systems with binarys complied for i386. The DirectX binarys under windows are build for pent or higher.

Program calls direct X.dll this then has to call a DirectX subsystem the drivers. Windows Direct X should be kicking wine Direct X into the ground. There is something stuffed up with the internals of windows Question what and can reactos avoid it and keep windows compad ie Gamers fun lighting fast Direct X. This problem has nothing to do with the gui changing the gui does not help performance that much under windows.
Mrkaras
Posts: 379
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2004 5:43 am
Location: Australia
Contact:

Post by Mrkaras »

ThePhysicist wrote:
I agree, but somebody (network administrator of a huge German company) told me that after working 8 hours on a PC, you will start to like the luna theme, because it's not only eyecandy, but it is more eye friendly for long time pc workers.
I agree too. like single click (vs doubble click) it taks a little while to get use to but then it is better.
geertvdijk
Posts: 318
Joined: Wed Jun 15, 2005 8:19 am

Post by geertvdijk »

i think it is a good thing to support visual styles, but with the 'classic' start menu (or at least classic menu as standard and an option for the xp-style menu, because the vista menu is based on xp, the only new thing is how the program list is viewed, and a search bar not so hard to code).
-graey-
Phalanx
Posts: 360
Joined: Sun Dec 19, 2004 12:42 am
Location: Australia

Post by Phalanx »

geertvdijk wrote:i think it is a good thing to support visual styles, but with the 'classic' start menu (or at least classic menu as standard and an option for the xp-style menu, because the vista menu is based on xp, the only new thing is how the program list is viewed, and a search bar not so hard to code).
Most people are use to the XP one now, so why not make it the default? Just cause you prefere it that way, does not mean everyone will.
ScoTTie
Posts: 165
Joined: Fri Feb 04, 2005 9:40 am

Post by ScoTTie »

You should set it to whatever the less tech savvy people prefer, everyone else will know (or work out) how to change it if they dont like it.
TOTMS
Posts: 112
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2005 3:00 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Visual Styles

Post by TOTMS »

Yes, it is certainly a good idea to make it 'skinable' like xp, but should not be a high priority. The classic 2k look is just fine atm. :D
Wiseman
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Dec 10, 2005 8:34 pm

Post by Wiseman »

Hi, I'm new here. An amazing work you're doing.

If I understood it correctly, ReactOS' long-term goal is to be a fully-compatible Windows replacement. The Windows XP theme system is part of the core, so eventually, you might want to implement them. Then again, they don't seem to matter to support applications, so it shouldn't be a top priority.

On top of that, there's StarDock's WindowBlinds, which, if it gets to work on ReactOS, will provide WinXP themes, and I'm hearing Windows Vista too.
TOTMS
Posts: 112
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2005 3:00 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Post by TOTMS »

Wiseman wrote:Hi, I'm new here. An amazing work you're doing.

If I understood it correctly, ReactOS' long-term goal is to be a fully-compatible Windows replacement. The Windows XP theme system is part of the core, so eventually, you might want to implement them. Then again, they don't seem to matter to support applications, so it shouldn't be a top priority.

On top of that, there's StarDock's WindowBlinds, which, if it gets to work on ReactOS, will provide WinXP themes, and I'm hearing Windows Vista too.
Winblinds is a cool program, but the annoying thing is it is more of a quasi-skinning program. It uses the builtin skinning abilities of WinXP, but has a runtime as well. The beauty of themes is that you can change the way an os looks without having an extra load on the system. Winblinds is pretty though, especially the Longhorn theme :lol:
Wiseman
Posts: 4
Joined: Sat Dec 10, 2005 8:34 pm

Post by Wiseman »

Winblinds has a runtime, but it allows Windows 2000 to support XP themes, and one day it may allow ReactOS to do the same if the XP theme system isn't built into it. This is why it could be interesting in the future.

As for system load, count on a performance cost for any theme system - be it Windows XP's native, Winblinds, Vista's, or a new one, and the more versatile, round, scalable, antialiased, or transparent a theme system allows themes to be, the slower it'll be. The fastest thing is Windows' native theme, which isn't made of bitmaps but low-level vector drawing and TrueType characters (cached as tiny 1bpp bitmaps) for the _□× buttons, but all you can customize for it are colors and fonts.
TOTMS
Posts: 112
Joined: Thu Sep 29, 2005 3:00 pm
Location: London, UK
Contact:

Post by TOTMS »

Wiseman wrote:Winblinds has a runtime, but it allows Windows 2000 to support XP themes, and one day it may allow ReactOS to do the same if the XP theme system isn't built into it. This is why it could be interesting in the future.

As for system load, count on a performance cost for any theme system - be it Windows XP's native, Winblinds, Vista's, or a new one, and the more versatile, round, scalable, antialiased, or transparent a theme system allows themes to be, the slower it'll be. The fastest thing is Windows' native theme, which isn't made of bitmaps but low-level vector drawing and TrueType characters (cached as tiny 1bpp bitmaps) for the _□× buttons, but all you can customize for it are colors and fonts.
I see what you are saying, but since Winblinds is a commercial product, the source code is definately not going to be available, therefore we wont be able to include it in any future distribution of ROS sadly.
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