Difficult to switch to minimized window of active program

[Grey Nicholson]

Binary package hint: unity

It's very difficult an unintuitive to switch to a minimised window of the active program without using the keyboard.

Clicking the launcher icon only scales the non-minimised window(s). The unintuitive workaround is to minimise the non-minimised windows of the active program and then click the launcher icon.

The Scale plugin showing minimised windows would fix this.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: unity 3.8.2-0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-7.39-generic 2.6.38
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-7-generic i686
Architecture: i386
CompizPlugins: [core,bailer,detection,composite,opengl,maximumize,compiztoolbox,decor,put,snap,text,move,mousepoll,ezoom,place,regex,grid,obs,wall,resize,imgpng,staticswitcher,commands,gnomecompat,vpswitch,session,animation,unitymtgrabhandles,fade,opacify,workarounds,addhelper,scale,unityshell,scaleaddon,scalefilter]
Date: Tue Apr 5 08:30:52 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Alpha i386 (20110326)
InstallationMedia_: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Alpha i386 (20110326)
InstallationMedia__: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Alpha i386 (20110326)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_GB:en
 LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature_: Ubuntu 2.6.38-7.39-generic 2.6.38
ProcVersionSignature__: Ubuntu 2.6.38-7.39-generic 2.6.38
SourcePackage: unity
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Alexandre Patenaude (alexandrep)]

I generally don't use often multiple windows of a same application. But I observed this behavior yesterday (and today). I agree with Greg: this is unintuitive, and makes Unity less functional at dealing with running windows/applications.

This is even more problematic with apps that have non-minimizable windows, like The GIMP. I just now tried to see what happen when opening multiple images in The GIMP, minimizing some of them, then trying to scale. And I got two different results (non of them being what I would have expected).

- The first time, I opened The GIMP, opened one image, opened a second image (I now have 3 visible windows: GIMP toolbar, image1, image2). I minimized the first image (visible windows are now GIMP toolbar and image2). I minimized the second image (visible windows are now only the GIMP toolbar). Trying to scale The GIMP would only allow me to see the toolbar; my images stay minimized. And the toolbar cannot be minimized, so I could not use Greg's trick. The only available option is to close The GIMP, then running it again. If I were modifying the two images, I would certainly have lost much work.

- The second time, I opened the GIMP, opened one image, opened a second image (I now have 3 visible windows: GIMP toolbar, image1, image2). I minimized the first image... and the toolbar gets minimized too! o_O (image2 is now the only visible window.) Tryning to scale The GIMP would only scale image2; I now don't have any access to either image1 or even the GIMP toolbar! I either have to minimize image2 to be able to scale all windows, or close image2/The GIMP.

Maybe there is an unknown button or shortcut that allows to scale minimized windows? If not, IMO, this is a major usability problem.