Submission details
Improve the UI for multiple monitors
OS X was developed in the days when a single 19 inch monitor was hot stuff. It was not designed for multiple monitors. As a result, it reduces the potential usability and productivity improvements that multiple monitors provide. Now that big LCDs are only a few hundred dollars, more and more Mac users are running multiple monitor setups. It's time to update the OS X UI to take advantage of multiple monitors.
There are lots of potential solutions. I'll leave it to the nice people at Apple to figure out which ones work best, but here are some ideas:
• Multiple docks
• Stretch the menu bar across the top of all monitors, or multiple menu bars
• Get Info windows that remember where they opened last, rather than always opening at the left side of the left monitor
• A contextual menu enhancement along the lines of Deja Menu
• Monitor-based Spaces
• Activate Dashboard on one only monitor, leaving the Desktop available on the other(s)
• Allow me to run as one user on one monitor, and another user on another
Medium
Medium
Not fixed
Discussion (9 comments)
Some quick notes:
1) Maybe... I know they wanted the Dock to be "one stop shopping" but maybe that would work. Personally, I think it would look a little silly to have the same dock on each monitor, but using different docs would raise the issue of what to do when the monitor went away.
2) Stretching the menu bar would just be annoying. Trust me, I've seen it done (well, sort of... long story) and it's more annoying than useful. Copying the menu bar so that it appears on each monitor is slightly better, although it might look a little funny - and if they did they should certainly give a way to turn it off. I used to use the secondary monitor or full screen previews, etc when I didn't want the menu bar getting in the way.
3) I actually like the fact that they always go in the same place, since I can predict it. I can agree that it should be on the same monitor where you were working, if that's possible.
6) Dashboard on only one at a time would be cool. How would it know which one, though? Mouse presence, open window placement? Hm...
7) Not a good idea, there are two many security issues for very little benefit, as I see it.
... I also think that Jaspar's idea of the dock following you around is interesting, but it breaks the dock as an anchor of the UI (unless you have it hidden, in which case what you talk about it tantamount to just having it on all screens).
My idea is just that the dock standard appears on one screen, your main screen, but you can temporarily call it to another by going, say, to the bottom of the screen. This would mean that after you move away from the dock on another screen it moves back into the main screen. Sort of a quick-acces to the dock instead of having to go the main screen. The ame with the menu bar (because let's face it: it is annoying that Photoshop's menu's only appear on your main screen, making you have to edit the photo there since you have no acces to controls on any other). At least, that would be the way I'de solve it. It would keep only one copy of each on a monitor, and return back to the main monitor after use.
Now not to pat my own back, but that solution would be easy to mplement and really usefull (if I had multiple monitors).
This is good, but some solutions are sort of not-good for certain situations:
Monitor one is Here, monitor 2 is outside a store showing a demo...
New users getting confused between docks
I love OS X's idea of document and not application-centric behaviour, and the unified menubar is such a nice step forward from my windows past. But it just breaks *so badly* when going to a two monitor system. It is really really poor UI when you have to mouse furiously across huge distances to use your menus. Duplicating the menu bar, or some cool way to "warp" to the menu bar from the second monitor would be very welcome.
Why do the Mac OS X programmers make the decision where to put the menu bar? Why are the users not allowed to decide what arrangement fits best for each of their individual applications (like those examples mentioned above)?
As a Switcher for instance I would have highly appreciated a more familiar look during the first few weeks using Mac OS X.
"Why do the Windows programmers make the decision where to put the menu bar? Why are the users not allowed to decide what arrangement fits best for each of their individual applications?"
I'm not trying to be too sarcastic here, but the situation isn't that different on other operating systems. The fact is, the user is stuck with some design decisions that whoever wrote it made. Mac OS X has inherited the design that the original Mac OS had and a lot of users like that. To make it configurable would force a large number of changes and break some other apps. Not that this is a bad thing necessarily, I think there is some merit to doing that for multiple monitors.
To be fair, however, you've got to admit that saying that you would have appreciated a more familiar look "during the first few weeks" is kind of a stretch. If you'd had the option you likely would have left it that way. Which is alright... that's what configurability is for, after all.
Would REALLY LIKE to see monitor-independent Spaces and multiple menubars. Spaces loses much of its functionality in a dual-monitor setup. I am often in the situation where I'd like to switch between two Spaces on my secondary monitor independently of what I'm doing on my primary monitor. For example, if I'm reading PDFs, reviewing a video clip, referring to an image on the secondary but I do everything else like coding, mail, web browsing, etc. on the primary.
"Possibility to separate Spaces in dual monitor mode" has its own thread here too
http://www.aquataskforce.com/view/80
jasper wrote on October 5, 2008, 3:56pm
I like the idea, but I think you should provide better solutions. Thinking about your idea, I would think that there is a good solution. When you move the mouse to the bottom of the screen, the dock should pop up there - no matter what screen you're on, and dissappear on the screen it was (once you move your mouse, though, it returns to the main screen) - same thing with the menu bar. I think this would solve your problem (depending on how you arranged your screens). Monitor-based spaces sounds a better idea, although (again) these shouldn't have their own docks nor menubars. The mixing users on monitors seems hard to pull off, since you could be dragging windows from user to user and there would be multiple docks with multiple content. But anyway, I like the idea.