Ubuntu 10.10 Netbook Edition Could Get a Global Menu

The basic desktop UI paradigm has been around for almost three decades now and, though they have clearly evolved, things generally change very slowly. It makes sense, OS makers don’t want to alienate their users with radical changes. Even Linux, which thrives on personalization options, hasn’t exactly stood out in this department.

Ubuntu has set out to change that and developers are looking at several ways to improve the usability of the Gnome desktop. Ubuntu 10.04 comes with quite a few, more or less, radical changes, the window controls are now on the left, for example, but even bigger things are planned for Ubuntu Nebook Edition.

“There are a number of constraints and challenges that are particular to netbooks, and often constraints can be a source of insight and inspiration. In this case, wanting to make the most of vertical space has driven the decision to embrace the single menu approach,” Mark Shuttleworth, the creator of Ubuntu, announced on his blog.

“We’re going to put the menu in the panel on the netbook edition of Ubuntu, and not on the desktop edition, because that’s where the screen real-estate is most precious,” he explained.

The window title has already been moved to the top panel, but things aren’t stopping here. The ubiquitous application menu will be next, getting ripped from the app window and moved to the panel. The move will be made in time for Ubuntu 10.10 and is intended to save up precious space in the small netbook screens.

Of course, just moving it from the application window to the panel doesn’t solve anything by itself, the menu will take up the same amount of vertical space. This is why Ubuntu is working on integrating the menu as well as the window title and controls with the panel. This is worth 24 pixels, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but that’s four percent of the vertical space in common netbooks.

By default, the user will see the window title and the controls and the menu will only show up when hovering the mouse above it, or by pressing the Alt key. All of this hasn’t been confirmed for inclusion in Ubuntu 10.10 as it’s very early in the development cycle, but, if everything goes smoothly, it should be available in Ubuntu Nebook Edition in six months’ time.