Unity (14.04) does not restore modal dialogs correctly after initiating desktop view

[Cs-gon]

Unity on 14.04 does not restore modal dialogs correctly after switching to desktop view (Ctrl+Super+D), when the user tries to restore a single application and therefore clicks on the application icon, while in desktop view mode. Then only the main window is restored, which (of course) does not react to any mouse or keyboard events, and (at least) confuses users.

However, if _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR is not set on the modal dialog, then a second click on the application icon does restore the modal dialog, but if the dialog has _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR set, it becomes impossible to restore the modal dialog (it is neither shown in spread view, nor in the context menu of the application icon or when using the application switcher using Alt-Tab). The modal dialog also does not get restored if the user presses Ctrl+Super+D to exit the desktop view, and the dialog has _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR set.

So the user has no "normal" method interact or even to close the application, which then needs to be killed (if the user even knows how to do that), or the user has to log out, with both scenarios possibly leading to loss of unsaved data.

Even worse, some applications (i.e. LibreOffice) don't close when a modal dialog is opened and the user tries to log out, so the session does not close and often the only option for a user is to power off the system hard.

Example for an application with modal dialog with _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR not set: nautilus and the about dialog

Example for an application with modal dialog with _NET_WM_STATE_SKIP_TASKBAR set: Java Control Panel (ControlPanel binary) and the about dialog (button on the first tab)