I'd like to introduce a little pet project of mine: Kustodian, which some people would call a ripoff of the mac dock or windows 7 taskbar. But I maintain it's a thing of it's own, but it indeed has some similarities.
The idea is that when you click one of the icons it launches a new application. The number next to the icon shows how many instances are already open, and when you hover such an icon a dropdown/popup immediately appears with thumbnails of the windows. When you click one of those thumbnails you bring the window to front/minimize/restore just like you are used to.
Some icons/applications on the Kustodian are marked as favorites and appear even when there is no number next to it. If you launch and application that is not already there it will appear and you should be able to mark it as favorite.
Now you might wonder how much of this already works. Well it's a real screenshot so the icons appear and disappear, and there is a list of hardcoded favorites, which can launch new instances. The popup is however blank at the moment, so I'd like to get some help from a plasma person who thinks this project is worth helping out. It follows that you cant actually manage your windows with this thing yet, although I've managed to use it as a day to day taskbar replacement for several months already
Update: I've committed to playground/base/plasma/applets/kustodian, but don't hesitate to contact me on irc #kustodian.
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Integrate systray
This sounds cool. I'm really waiting for such a launcher
I think it would be cool to also integrate the systray functionality of apps where it makes sense, Amarok, Kopete, Kmail, Korganizer etc. come to my mind. So e.g. with Amarok clicking launches a new one if not running or activates the running one otherwise, also it could display the state (playing, paused...) and show the context menu. Offering directly accessible main actions actions like Play, Stop etc would be cool as well, perhaps as an overlay on hover (like the +/- in Dolphin). The Kopete icon could turn into this animation when a new message arrives.
Yessss, I hate having two icons (SystemTray + TaskManager)
Yessss, I hate having two icons (SystemTray + TaskManager) for Kopete, Akregator, Amarok and so on!!! Maybe will hard but would be great integrate that options into the contextual menu.
I tried it and I like it. My needs to be usable in everyday work are:
1. No crashing
2. Being able to add/remove favorite apps
3. Being able to disable app names (12 inch laptop so I don't got much space)
4. Do not launch app with right click
If anybody wants a Debian package I uploaded here: http://code.google.com/p/kfirefox/downloads/list
Update: Instance counter would be great to be in the same style as Microblogging/Twitter plasmoid (1/3 height, white brackgound, bottom-right, 33% transparency I think). I am working in several plasmoids and with that's a good standard for counters in iconified plasmoids.
Coud you show me a screenshot
Coud you show me a screenshot of this instance counter. It sounds interesting. And of the 4 items you have only number 3 si not on my todo. I guess someone else will have to contribute that.
i like this
Along w/ favorites and showing all open instances it would be nice if an Icon could be limited to only open a new instance of an application if it is not already running. if the application is running then it would just take you to that instance.
This is something I miss from the Amiga (commodities) that has never been implemented really well and could make your application really stand out.
I can definitely see myself using Kustodian.
Great copy!
Many likes the idea of this combination and actually the windows 7 "superbar" is copy of the mac osx version as well.
I would be very happy to see option on the current taskbar that it would show only icons, not text at all. There are one plasmoid of that in kde-look site, called stask.
There is already sth like this, Fancy Tasks Plasmoid
There is already sth like this,
Fancy Tasks Plasmoid ok KDE-Look.org
Maybe it is better to work on features, usability and generally polish one application?
Or do you have a different vision for Kustodian?
regards
Fancy Tasks tries to do too
Fancy Tasks tries to do too many things. You can't integrate it on a panel with other plasmoids.
I do not know about that. I
I do not know about that. I believe we need this plasmoid as well. Fancy tasks and stask are nice but they try too much imitate mac osx panel.
This one looks great and I hope it does not get forgotten.
Thanks that is the motivation
Thanks that is the motivation I needed. I too don't like to follow the mac dock too much
I would like to test this
I would like to test this plasmoid but I dont know how to get it installed. It is nice it is on KDE trunk/SVN but problem is that I do not know how to get it installed. Need to check if I get time tommorrow to come on IRC channel to ask it
I have few questions about the tray. Like is it possible to get alone to panel so it would work more like the Windows 7 "superbar" or is it just the own panel?
I got this kind idea and made fast mockup of it. Because I liked to numbers thing on the panel.
http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/6630/snapshot12.th.png
And one wonderfull idea what I really like is the application name below the icon!
I made one mockup for KDE4 brainstroming on kde-look.org about the menu. http://kde-look.org/content/show.php/KDE+4.3+new+plasma-panel?content=96882
I am hoping this panel gets to official widget to 4.4. Because we really need other panels as well than just one!