Jonas Dreßler from the GNOME project published a report on the status of adapting the GNOME Shell for smartphones. The work received a grant awarded by the German Ministry of Education to support publicly significant software projects.
It is noted that adaptation for smartphones is facilitated by the presence of a certain foundation for operation on small touch screens in the latest GNOME releases. For example, there is a customizable application navigation interface that supports arbitrary reorganization through a drag-and-drop mechanism and a multi-page layout. Screen gestures are already supported, such as the swipe gesture for changing screens, which are similar to control gestures needed on mobile devices. Many GNOME concepts used on desktop systems, such as a quick settings block, notification system, and on-screen keyboard, can also be applied to mobile devices.
Within the project for adapting GNOME for mobile devices, developers have outlined a functional development plan and prepared working prototypes of the home screen, application launcher interface, search system, on-screen keyboard, and other core concepts. However, specific attendant features such as PIN code screen unlocking, accepting calls during screen lock, emergency calls, flashlight, etc., are not yet covered. The Pinephone Pro smartphone is used as a testing platform for the developments.
The main tasks identified include:
- A new API for two-dimensional gesture navigation (a new gesture tracking mechanism has been implemented along with reworked input handling in Clutter).
- Detection of smartphone launch and adaptation of interface elements for small screens (implemented).
- Creation of a separate panel layout for mobile devices - an upper panel with indicators and a lower panel for navigation (in development).
- Workspaces and organization of work with multiple running applications. Launching programs on mobile devices in full-screen mode (in development).
- Adapting the navigation interface for the list of installed applications for different screen resolutions, such as creating a compact version for proper operation in portrait mode (in progress).
- Creating a virtual keyboard for use in portrait mode (in the conceptual prototype stage).
- Developing a quick settings interface that is convenient for mobile device usage (in the conceptual prototype stage).
Source: opennet.ru
