Multiple Monitors UX Specification

I think part of the problem with Ubuntu's UX direction has been the extreme reliance on context for everything. Menus change location and contents, buttons change their behavior or just disappear, all in the name of 'sleek'. It drove me mad and ended up being counter-intuitive for the non-geeks in the family.

The sad this is, that this whole specification is centered about the classical stacked window management paradigm and the assumption, that one window can be placed at only one screen at a time. However given modern compositing WM methods it was perfectly possible (and is implemented by experimental WMs) to place windows independently on multiple screens.

Wow, did Ubuntu finally realize that quite a few people actually use more than one display?! That's so amazing. Only a few years behind Windows and Mac... But what's a few years in the realm of computers. ;)

Maybe one day they'll also realize that most of their potential users come from the Windows environment, so forcing some unnecessary UI differences against decade-old habits (like min/max/close buttons on the left) is a great way to drive most people away.

Heck, maybe one day they'll even fix those trivial bugs that linger in Ubuntu for years... Like being able to change a desktop wallpaper from the Image Viewer more than once in a row.

One of those days (maybe around 18.04 LTS) Ubuntu won't make you feel like ripping your hair out because of the most trivial inconveniences. And maybe then I'll be able to recommend it to people.

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[And that all typed from Ubuntu 11.10, which I use for 4 months now.]

[And yes, I know you can use more than one monitor with Ubuntu right now, but what I'm saying is that it's troublesome (compared to Windows 7) and very buggy.]