Blog: Natural Desktop, To-Do Lists

Saturday, July 17, 2004 by Frogboy | Discussion: WinCustomize News

One of the projects we're working on right now that's been quite a blast is tentatively called The Natural Desktop.  It's similar in execution to Aquarium Desktop. Aquarium Desktop has done so well that it makes sense to come up with other ideas to let people make their desktop come alive. 

So in Natural Desktop, we're contracted well known composer Mason Fisher to put together natural sounds based on what time of the day it is and current weather conditions. Those of us stuck working in-doors can appreciate having a subtle background sound of morning doves and birds chirping or the occasional cicada in the background. Or if it's raining the gentle sound of rain falling.  The second part of the project, the visual part, is a wallpaper project where we're scouting around for top wallpaper authors to put together good wallpapers of scenery depending on a) the time of day and the season.  So the wallpaper would change over the course of the day based on what time of year it is.  The last part is a dynamic weather widget which blows away any weather object that's been made so far (totally animated at all times, it's really amazing).  We're hoping to get this out by the first week of August but it depends on our success in getting the wallpapers together. 

Speaking of Aquarium Desktop, we are looking at putting out booster packs for it that provide additional fish. We've gotten some new fish rendered and should be ready in the next several weeks to start making those available. They would go right along side the existing fish that make up the Aquarium desktop.

We hope to have a new ObjectDock Plus beta ready to go in the next day or two.  Tons of little glitches have been fixed, most of which I'd never noticed but users reported and got reproduced/fixed. I will try to put together a video of ObjectDock Plus in action.  The screenshots, as others can tell you, don't really tell the story.  I'm using it probably in a very unusual way.  I have a series of ONE tab docks strewn about my screen now.  Think of them as drawers. Docks can be shaped in weird ways.  So I have various drawers on my desktop that I keep various "things" in.

It gave me an idea for an ObjectDock Plugin I'd like to see.  I'd like to see a plugin that when clicked on creates a "To-Do" item. So when I click on it, a little bubble appears and I type in what I have to do. It then creates a new ObjectDock icon with its own distinct icon.  I could then move these items to my "To-Do" drawers.  When I finish that task, I can go to the drawer and drag it off and feel a bit of satisfaction watching that "Puff".  I don't know if ObjectDock supports virtual icons (i.e. items that aren't anchored to something that resides on your hard disk). But if not, that's something I think would be pretty neat.

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Latin4567
Reply #1 Saturday, July 17, 2004 11:56 AM
HEY! that was my idea... i have been working on it for months >. I even had a forum thread about it > > >

Reble
Reply #2 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:03 PM
Nice to hear of coming updates for Objectdock Plus.

Frogboy
Reply #3 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:19 PM
Latin: Which? The To-Do plugin or the Natural Desktop concept?

Latin4567
Reply #4 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:30 PM
natural desktop... i havew been working on wallpaper sets for a long time, i was going to make a dx theme that changed according to the weather outside

Latin4567
Reply #5 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:36 PM
it was going to be like the new longhorn bliss, only it changes according to the weather

JDavidHarper
Reply #6 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:37 PM
Hey, um... whoever does it, I'm looking forward to it. Sounds like a cool idea.

j dott
Reply #7 Saturday, July 17, 2004 12:57 PM
I certainly second the OD+ to-do list proposal. A tab with all my to-dosrepresented graphically with an icon and a description on mouseover, would be really great. Andreas' calendar object is great for appointments and such, but a to-do list is certainly needed. One of the things that makes OD+ so much more than just an app launcher is the ability to have docklets that present you with informationeven when the desktop is behind open windows. Right now I am running the calendar object, a weather object, winamp and itunes objects, a mailchecker, a battery meter, several sys stats objects, the clock, and two instances of Dan Winsor's Dockfeeder RSS feed object. All of these tools present information so readily that they really become part of a productive day for meI don't have to stop what I'm doing to go get information, it is already there. A to-do list seems like one more important piece of the puzzleand dragging off completed items into oblivion would be worth the purchase price in itself.

Scatoligist
Reply #8 Saturday, July 17, 2004 1:40 PM
Is there a bug report list for od+?

SelfExiled
Reply #9 Saturday, July 17, 2004 2:24 PM
The aquarium tank had fish. Will the forest theme have little rodents or animals in it? Like a squirrel on one of the trees. Or a little mouse scurrying across the leaves. Maybe a snake following after him. A deer foraging from time to time. These sorts of things would make it quite unique. Much like the fish aquariums were when they first came out.

I do think that Aqua Real has the best aquarium tank available. Heck, you can feed and even touch those fish. That's wild.

Qmix
Reply #10 Saturday, July 17, 2004 2:49 PM
Looking forward to your Dock Plus video

Chef Cz
Reply #11 Saturday, July 17, 2004 2:54 PM
Look's cool Looking forward to its release from somebody

Essencay
Reply #12 Saturday, July 17, 2004 4:53 PM
This woods desktop theme sounds very cool.

XX
Reply #13 Saturday, July 17, 2004 4:59 PM
"i was going to make a dx theme that changed according to the weather outside "

You can't make a copyright claim when it was just an idea. To claim it, you must have had made it and uploaded it somewhere.

culverSE
Reply #14 Saturday, July 17, 2004 5:00 PM
If it does all of what you plan, it sounds like a real winner that non-skinning consumers would even love.

MindlessPuppet
Reply #15 Saturday, July 17, 2004 5:12 PM
I think a city desktop would be cool, like the same premise as the natural desktop but with cars and what not, and less cars at night... and there'd be hotdog stands... and poodles... Oh man that'd be cool, hotdog stands and poodles...

I seem to recall a wallpaper program that had animated desktops, not like DesktopX as it wasn't interactive. ANYHOW, one of its backgrounds was a canyon with a sky and cloud animated in high speed play, and it had a day night cycle. It also had a huge watermark... which is why I got rid of it... er.. yeah... I rant sometimes.

CerebroJD
Reply #16 Saturday, July 17, 2004 5:36 PM
Latin: You're STILL workin on that?!

I put together one in like, 3 minutes the other day using the images I offered you, but you didnt like. How can this be taking months? *sigh* Whatever.


Frogboy: That all sounds incredible! Great idea with the Natural Desktop, and I cant wait for the OD+ video.

GAIAStevef
Reply #17 Saturday, July 17, 2004 5:45 PM
I'd absolutly be in line for the "natural desktop" concept... I spend me day at work with headphones and relaxingaudio's "atmospheres" audio generator to keep from losing my mind in the cubicle farm, so the extra visuals of a full desktop would really be a plus.

Hopefully it won't end up being too CPU intensive.

Latin4567
Reply #18 Saturday, July 17, 2004 7:02 PM
i cant work on it until someone helps me with the walls

Frogboy
Reply #19 Saturday, July 17, 2004 7:35 PM
Yea, the key to natural desktop, in my opinion, is NOT the wallappers but rather the sounds.  When I'm working in the morning, I want to hear those morning doves.  that's the things that makes me most conscious about working in the summer is that I'm inside with just the usual office sound.  I want to hear the outside or something like it.

flipdoubt
Reply #20 Saturday, July 17, 2004 9:44 PM
Actually, I've been writing up a vision statement for a "desktop of the mind" sort of thing that is exactly like your To-Do list idea. All these widgets sound great, but where are people posting widgets for OD+?

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