shithub: touchuichal

ref: 843ca3633dfc4e757f6aed8337b5181201f4d309
dir: /touchuichal.txt/

View raw version
[[[ms
.FP lucidasans
. \" no header
.ds CH "
.
.HTML "Towards a Touch User Interface for Plan 9"
.TL
Towards a Touch User Interface for Plan 9
.AU
Joel Fridolin Meyer
joel@sirjofri.de
.AI
.AB
The Plan 9 operating system has a specific idea for user interaction and user interfaces.
In general, many aspects are thought-through and provide a mostly consistent look and feel throughout the whole operating system.
However, all user interaction components are designed for a standard computer screen in mind, paired with keyboard and mouse for interaction.
In this paper we will explore different challenges we encounter when designing a specialized touch user interface for Plan 9 systems.
.AE
]]]

# Why do we need a touch user interface?

Hello World.

Next paragraph.

Actual contents:

- Many modern computer systems come with touch screens only, without traditional input methods.

# Why do we need a Plan 9-specific user interface?

- Plan 9 OS is much different than other OSes.
- It has very specific idea of IPC, user interaction and what a computer is.

# Challenges

## Well-known user interface challenges

- Different screen sizes (phone, tablet, much bigger differences than on PC).
- Touch challenges (thumb size, multi touch, ...).
- Probably nothing new, refer to existing documents.

## Three pillars of user interfaces on Plan 9

### Text interface

- shell interface
- rio/window

### Graphics

- devdraw

### Mouse interaction

- mouse chording
- rio/window integration

## Integrated system components

### Plumber

- How plumber is important for Plan 9 UI
- It should be natively integrated and feel natural to use it.

### Namespaces

- How to visualize and manage namespaces on Plan 9, using touch UI.
- Dynamic, per-process namespaces are an integral part of Plan 9.