Alt text:

Twitter post by Daniel Feldman (@d_feldman): Linux is the only major operating system to support diagonal mode (credit [Twitter] @xssfox). Image shows an untrawide monitor rotated about 45 degrees, with a horizontal IDE window taking up a bottom triangle. A web browser and settings menu above it are organized creating a window shape almost like a stepped pyramid.

Edit: alt text

  • @ZangooseOP
    link
    English
    24211 months ago

    Another funny concept

      • @grue
        link
        English
        3811 months ago

        That, right there, is a perfect example of why folks need to stop trying to shoehorn web apps everywhere they don’t belong. It’s a use-case for a proper native mobile app if ever there was one.

        • @owsei
          link
          2711 months ago

          even if it’s just mobile

          you already have to handle landscape/portrait mode

          now imagine having to handle angled

          • @grue
            link
            English
            30
            edit-2
            11 months ago

            That’s why you should’ve just handled arbitrary rotations instead of inventing a finite predefined set of orientation “modes” in the first place.

            Things get a lot easier in the long run if you aggressively look for commonalities and genericize the code that handles them instead of writing bunches of one-off special cases.

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                English
                1111 months ago

                Peak evil - well done. How much is the extra fee to wrap a letterbox around the circle on a conventional aspect ratio?

                There’s good money in this idea!

              • @[email protected]
                link
                fedilink
                English
                411 months ago

                Personally I went for the globe display, because I figured that was a more globally applicable format.

            • @owsei
              link
              1011 months ago

              true

              however

              everything would be fluid in the layout and you would need to set what should go on top of what. And having this feature doesn’t seem worth the hassle of making if work, or even using it.

              Imagine trying to type in a ‘fluid’ keyboard

              TBH tho, seems like a cool gimmick for some apps.

            • @rambaroo
              link
              211 months ago

              That’s called over-engineering for use cases that don’t and won’t exist. Please lecture us some more though.

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          911 months ago

          Yeah, but I don’t want to have an app on my phone for a store I go to once. I don’t give a fuck if the page is ugly.

          • @grue
            link
            English
            7
            edit-2
            11 months ago

            That just means it shouldn’t be a native app or a web app, but instead should be a plain ol’ webpage that doesn’t try to do app-y things in the first place. The notion that web pages have any legitimate reason to know your viewport size (let alone anything at all about the screen hardware itself) is like one of those “statements dreamed up by the utterly deranged” memes, except not satirical.

            Seriously: literally the entire defining principle of HTML (well, aside from the concept of “hyperlinks”) is that the client has the freedom to decide how the page should be rendered, but misguided – or megalomaniacal – graphic designers webmasters front-end web “devs” have been trying to break it ever since.

            • @rambaroo
              link
              411 months ago

              Lol - in your other comment you suggested that web devs key off of screen rotation to resize the page, but now you’re saying the client shouldn’t know anything about the viewport at all? Which is it? And why would the rotation angle be useful if I don’t know the aspect ratio of the screen? Or are we now assuming that widescreen will be a thing forever? I thought your ingenius idea was to be able to handle any use case.

              • @grue
                link
                English
                111 months ago

                Lol - in your other comment you suggested that web devs key off of screen rotation to resize the page, but now you’re saying the client shouldn’t know anything about the viewport at all? Which is it?

                Legitimate apps key off screen rotation do fancy stuff. Web pages let the browser render them and don’t try to do fancy stuff. It’s not that fucking hard.

                • @[email protected]
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  111 months ago

                  Follow up question, would it ideally work like the old Java Applets then, where you have to explicitly ask to launch a web app?

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              311 months ago

              or a web app, but instead should be a plain ol’ webpage

              I did not know about that distinction.

              Hmm, so are there actual inadequacies in the browser-rendered standards that lead people to do this? I’d buy that it’s purely webpage sponsors wanting to be an all-powerful decider that controls what everyone sees and possibly thinks, but on the other hand I don’t know enough about browser rendering and page design to be sure. All my webpages are pretty spartan and scream “backend guy”.

              It’d sure be nice if we could go back to circa-2012 with no popups or stupid bloat.

            • @[email protected]
              link
              fedilink
              English
              111 months ago

              I sort of agree with you to a degree, but I also think that the browser having knowledge of the size of your viewport actually has some use. Now, I would probably like it more if all webpages were just made with the restriction of not knowing the viewport size since that would dictate some design choices. Cellphones can just scroll around the page anyways. They should be second class citizens on the internet anyway in my opinion. The smartphone has been one of the worst inventions for the human race with how much it seems to isolate a lot of people more than connecting them.

          • @rambaroo
            link
            211 months ago

            The thread OP has an axe to grind against web devs because he thinks they’ve ruined the Internet.

        • @TrickDacy
          link
          111 months ago

          shoehorn web apps everywhere they don’t belong

          Who is doing that? In my experience, “web apps” are on the web or occasionally on desktop and are fine. Slack for example, is a fabulous desktop app and has used web tech from day one to great success

          • @ZangooseOP
            link
            English
            611 months ago

            VS code is an electron app, there are a few others that have a simple enough purpose that they shouldn’t be using a whole dedicated chrome engine to function.

            • @TrickDacy
              link
              111 months ago

              Vs code is an exemplary app and supports what I’m saying. As far as others…what’s the right amount of complexity for using electron? Imo the maintenance advantages alone almost justify using it. It’s not appropriate for every app but slack and vs code are pretty stellar examples of how well it can work.

              • @ZangooseOP
                link
                English
                6
                edit-2
                11 months ago

                VS code is a good app in spite of using electron, not because of it. There’s no reason a simple plaintext editor needs to allocate 300MB of ram even without extensions just to launch, and there is definitely no reason a plaintext editor should require compiling chromium to build from source.

                Slack is fine, but only when you exclusively use slack. Throw in an actual browser, discord, VS Code, Whatsapp, teams (?), etc. each with their own chromium instance and now your 16GB of ram are being eaten up at idle.

                • @TrickDacy
                  link
                  111 months ago

                  I mean yeah it’s a little heavy. Same trade off everyone makes every time they load a web app of any kind.

                  I run a lot of those apps concurrently and I don’t have issues with not having enough ram.

        • gregorum
          link
          fedilink
          English
          1
          edit-2
          11 months ago

          This could totally be adapted into a game for a very interesting immersive experience. Imagine entire worlds of gameplay that adapted to the orientation of your viewport.

      • @[email protected]
        link
        fedilink
        English
        12
        edit-2
        11 months ago

        Yeah, I actually miss this sometimes, when I’m lounging in some weird position. The question is how much the keyboard would suck.

        • @Pregnenolone
          link
          English
          1411 months ago

          The diagonal agenda is coming for your kids!!!

        • @[email protected]
          link
          fedilink
          English
          611 months ago

          ah yes, i’ve been propagandized into… wanting my phone to have a diagonal mode

          there are very few things more politically neutral than this.

    • gregorum
      link
      fedilink
      English
      6
      edit-2
      11 months ago

      Congratulations. In almost 30 years, this is the first thing that finally made me want to throw my phone when I saw it.

      • @fidodo
        link
        -110 months ago

        Smart phones haven’t existed for 30 years…

        • gregorum
          link
          fedilink
          English
          210 months ago

          I’ve had cell phones for 30 years. Never mentioned anything about them being smart the whole time.

          • @fidodo
            link
            -110 months ago

            What would you be able to see on a 30 year old cell phone that would make you throw it? A weird number?

            • gregorum
              link
              fedilink
              English
              1
              edit-2
              10 months ago

              i’d like to know what hallucinogen you’re on or neurological damage you have, as you keep responding to things i never said-- i never mentioned a 30 year-old cell phone.

              • @fidodo
                link
                -110 months ago

                So “in 30 years” you never wanted to throw your non existent cell phone. Your original comment just doesn’t make sense.

                • gregorum
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  1
                  edit-2
                  10 months ago

                  It doesn’t make sense to you, because something is very wrong with your brain.

                  Best of luck with that

      • Chewy
        link
        fedilink
        111 months ago

        Linux phones aren’t supported because it’s an Xorg feature. Usually Linux phones use Wayland for the better (touch) experience. If someone wanted to they could implement it on a Wayland compositor, but given that no other OS I know of supports diagonal mode, I wouldn’t hold my breath.

    • @[email protected]
      link
      fedilink
      111 months ago

      Honestly though, I have an iPhone SE and holding it diagonally like that is pretty comfy. Could actually be on to something here.

      • @Trollception
        link
        111 months ago

        Not familiar with an iPhone SE, assuming it’s a smallish phone?