Unity launcher animation wrongly implies slowness

[candtalan]

Using Ubuntu 11.10 (or 11.04) I see the Unity launcher icons animate when used, however the style of the animation and particularly the graphical animation cycle time gives a user impression that things are happening slowly. This is an unfortunate impression, and might be fixable.
I measure the animation cycle period to be approximately 2.5 seconds. Even watching an analogue clock face seconds hand is boring, and that is 2 1/2 times faster than the launcher icon animation.
Subjective impression is a subtle thing, I like Unity, but using it more just recently I wondered why I felt frustrated, and I think this animation is one significant factor. I have seen many adverse comments on Unity and most are not specific. I think 'impression' may be important in some of these cases.
I suggest that launcher icon animation be considered such that *immediately* on selection, a fast and brief animation is seen, maybe a shiver or a boundary size toggle small and back again. Then for the remainder of the waiting time something non changing such as a dimmed brightness of the icon or other non changing feature, simply confirming that action is in progress. But whatever is seen from the animation it must not be slow, which easily is interpreted as a poor response.
HTH

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[candtalan (aeclist)]

I add this comment because I have now been using Unity continuously (not just occasional tests as I had used it previously) on my main machine for a month and I am even more convinced that the Launcher Icon animation and response to user click gives a pretty bad impression. Not only does the animation make the user (me) feel depressed because of the slowness (already detailed in earlier comments) but even on my fairly fast quad core machine, it is never possible to be sure that an app is actually started! At the instant of mouse click on the icon, that is. This is the actual moment when the user has decided what they want - they want to start this app. A click does nothing - repeat - nothing - to (immediately) confirm to the user that Unity is responding. This is a real downer, and I believe is responsible for some of the ongoing negative reaction about the Launcher, and, probably, Unity itself.

I -implore- you to reconsider the priority of this bug and set it to a high priority.

Aside comment:
My more serious use of Unity has now shown that an associated bug also exists, which is pretty important if Ubuntu wants to roll out to a wider user base, to users who are not tuned to very rapidly use mouse clicks, like myself. This causes me endless irritation and uncertainty all the time - Unity is -hard- to love (however worthy!) as long as small but important GUI irritations and suggestions of slowness are placed directly between the user and what they are immediately trying to do:
#992132 Launcher icons go into 'move position' mode too quickly