What is your preferred panel/dock/taskbar placement?
 

Windows 7 had the default (and famous) taskbar at the bottom. Others have it at the top. Ubuntu made the shift to the vertical left-sided panel.

At the end it all boils down to the user preference.

What in your opinion, is the most effective and preferred placement? Why is it? Is it design, accessibility or any other factor?

Would love to hear your ideas!

Voted 'other' as I don't have a panel :D

Oops I forgot to add that option and can't edit now :s.

So you use just right-click and icons?

No icons either - a root menu, a conky and an autohiding notification area (bottom right - which may be considered a 'panel' by a broader definition than yours ... :D )

The taskbar should be on the bottom. This is to avoid a clash with the window buttons. I mean if you put the taskbar on the top then you might accidentally close a window.

I also have a dock on the left for gkrellm. This is also on the left to avoid closing windows accidentally (if it were on the right).

I hope this thread is not corrupted into a tiling window manager vs regular window manager flame war.

Personally i prefer the bottom, I can live with it at the top but I guess force of habit always has me looking to the bottom first. What I don't like is both top and bottom, seems to be just an unnecessary waste of desktop space to me.

As for waste of space concerns, all the docks, panels, taskbars I have are auto-hide. I have also optimized all my applications for maximum use of space and also maximum functionality.

I prefer the taskbar on the bottom with KDE, XFCE, and Cinnamon, mainly out of a matter of habit.

I have my panel on the top. Problems with window buttons don't apply to me, since I don't have window decorations and I use the panel for informational purposes only (no clicking on it ever).

I can't bear to have the Windows Taskbar anywhere but at the bottom, and I can't bear to have the GNOME panel anywhere but at the top. I think it just must be habit.

I agree 100%. I've tried all kinds of combinations -- but in X11 i just cannot stand a bottom toolbar. And in windows, it just cannot be anywhere else but the bottom. Its from years and years of it being that way...

edit: now i use openbox,.. so i have the tint2 bar on the bottom, and conky running on the right.

Top right (if I have an option to control the length of the panel, I usually set it at about 2/3 the width of the screen).

Moving the mouse and eyes up seems more natural in my workflow.

I also prefer desktop environments in which the menu can be invoked from anywhere on an empty area of the desktop with a mouse-click, such as Fluxbox, Enlightenment, and XFCE. Why expend all that effort when you don't have to?:)

Top for me, autohide. But I do keep docky on the bottom with XFCE Debian. Same with windows, top with dock at bottom. Don't know why just seems best for me.

I have the panel on top, because I prefer it there. There is also the added bonus of the system not looking looking like Windows.:D
My preferred position would actually be vertical on the right side of the screen, but that would only work if only displaying icons. I like to have at least part of the name displayed, especially when working with documents/files. Good luck with that using a vertical panel.

A GUI that cannot do that is not a real GUI.:D


Did someone mention desktop icons? Oh, for shame.

I use mate with the top and bottom panels on my laptops. I have the top for quick launchers and notifications; and the bottom for task manager displaying open programs from all desktops.

On my desktop computer how ever i have a much larger screen, so i run kde, with the panel setup on the left with the icon task manager. Depending on my screen real estate, i determine my panel setup.

Top or bottom works for me, but I prefer the top so voted that way.

(grin) I stopped using desktop icons 10 years ago, even before I started using Linux. In my world, they are a waste of space that hides my pretty background pictures.

I think it's just a matter of personal preference, and what works for one person may not work for another.

I keep the KDE taskbar panel at the bottom, with auto hide. I like to keep it off the screen and out of my sight for the most part, but easily accessible when I need it.

Depends
 

When using a Win OS, I find that the taskbar works best at the bottom. The top or either side always posed the problem of potential missteps. Using Mint, I prefer the panel at the top.

Depends, sometimes I feel like a not

http://oi49.tinypic.com/33a8936.jpg

Sometimes I do

http://oi39.tinypic.com/29llnbt.jpg

Sometimes I just go crazy

http://oi41.tinypic.com/fxglx.jpg

on the display, of course. :)

Top panel always visible, bottom panel on autohide.

Ditto, and not productive at all. Too much moving around:s

I prefer vertical and autohide.

Bottom panel
 

I have gotten used to the panel on the bottom, and that is most comfortable to me. However, with certain applications, the bottom panel is in the way. The solution for me was to put 'hide' buttons on both the top panel and the bottom panel. I generally hide the top panel then on startup using the 'hide' button. On occasion, though, I might have to hide the bottom panel.... easy enough with the 'hide' button. Then I can unhide either the top or the bottom panel as needed.
I have most of my most used panel widgets placed on the bottom panel, such as workspace switcher, main menu, logout, calculator, weather, date/time, etc. The only ones I have on the top panel are notification, date/time, and main menu.
I suppose I should have voted "other," as I actually have two. But since the top panel is almost always hidden, and I could get along just fine without it, I voted for the bottom. The 'hide/un-hide' buttons are very unobtrusive, so they aren't a problem. I don't especially like the 'auto-hide' feature as it is prone to adverse reactions if/when your mouse gets quirky.
Sadly, Gnome 2xx is history. But Mate will do till something better comes along. I do NOT mean to disparage Mate, nor the fine work done by the Mate developers. But, truthfully, Mate is a very good Gnome-2xx-wannabe. So, the panel from Mate, either top or bottom, with nearly all of the panel widgets previously available with the Gnome 2xx panel works very well for me. And my computer challenged wife hardly knows the difference between Gnome 2xx and Mate.

I've got a statusbar at the bottom. No icons - all done through keybindings.

Hi there,

all Windows versions since 4 (95/98, NT4) had it like that, not only the bastards Windows 6 (Vista) and its successors.

In Windows, I used to have a two-row taskbar at the bottom. Two rows, because there was too much that just "had to be there": The Start button, the Quick Launch icons, the actual task bar, the notification area, and clock and calendar in the right-hand corner.

After migrating to Ubuntu, then Mint, I got used to placing one panel at the bottom (the main menu and the task bar) and one at the top (Launcher icons, notification icons, clock and calendar with current weather stats).

If I had to use a widescreen monitor, which I avoid as long as I can (I'm glad I have a high resolution 4:3 display), I'd consider placing the panels left and right to compensate for the nasty over-wide display proportions. It could be difficult to get used to that, but sounds reasonable to me.

[X] Doc CPU

Taskbar at the bottom. I'm just used to it being there on all my systems now, so it helps avoid confusion and makes things simpler.

I use fvwm2 and (I suppose) have a conceptually different view of the world than UIs modelled after windoze, but when I started using wide screens, I found it much more convenient to move the 'stuff' I previously had at the bottom of the screen to the LHS of the screen. I didn't find it took any time to get used to.

I spent a bit of time playing around with other window managers, because fvwm2 does not work around a focus bug exhibited by (some) Java guis. What I did discover is that (it seems) a lot of other WMs do not really like putting their taskbar/pagers/icons/what-have-you on the side, even though they let you do it. (There is a variety of problems, including text that is rotated 90 degrees, inability to pick appropriate sizes or aspect ratios of gui items, etc.) Admittedly, perhaps someone with expertise in any one of those WMs would know how to set it up nicely.

Cheers.

I usually accept the default location from each distro.

But I prefer it at the bottom because I'm used to it from my early days of using windows. And is my vote s well.

used to the bot
 

used to the bottom from early windows [98+se],so I like it there..I just do not know how to do it in Ubuntu 12.04.1LTS , which is a pain since it is a standard Svga monitor , not a wide screen HD display and takes away from open stuff in the desk top view and hot mail is so wide now it does not display correct . plus I like more then 1 site open . then I arrange my files on the right side of the desk so i just move an open window to the left to get to files . Next lcd with new vid card will have to be 4k capable I guess [dream?]

Hi there,

yea, you may be dreaming. But as I usually say: Nobody lives off their dreams. But those who dream are still alive.
Seriously, I haven't yet seen computer monitors with a resolution of more than 1920x1200, and if I had such a display, I might even consider using it in portrait orientation. Because whatever application I use - most of them call for more space in the vertical axis, whether it's web browsing, word processing, software development IDEs, and many more. Even watching videos on the PC monitor rarely requires more than 1024 pixels horizontally (that's DVD video in widescreen).

Currently I'm using 1600x1200 as the primary monitor, and 1280x1024 as the secondary. And already I'm becoming dainty thinking that 1600x1200 should be the absolute minimum. ;-)

[X] Doc CPU

NO panels ANYWHERE!

I use bashrun for lauching most programs. I don't have icons on the desktop - that is where conky is. I create aliases instead of shortcuts/icons. Somethings are bound to they keboard for quick access.

I HATE taskbars/panels!!!


>= 2560x1600

I prefer the bottom, and auto-hide it. (That's where I learned to look for it when [IIRC] I started with a TRS-80.)

I also have a fairly rare mental abnormality: My visual memory (and visualization ability) is almost completely missing, so "icons" are, for me, usually meaningless. My desktop, by default, is just my wallpaper, which I change automatically, in random order, independently, on each screen and workspace, every minute.

On the bottom. Tried it on the top and just didn't like it.

Bottom... because a quick mouse move to the total top-right plus a mouse click will close the current maximized window. Just got used to it..

When CDE came out it was on the bottom. I moved from CDE to KDE and have lost some of the 'CDE' features over time such as the "filing cabinet" (ready a folder in the panel). I would like to see "shared-x" make a come-back.

It varies a bit over time but I:
Always have:1x panel at either top or bottom, always shown, with menus, windows-list, taskbar/indicators, workspace-switcher, ...;
And sometimes, only sometimes + 1x panel/dock with quick-launchers (and possibly some monitoring applets) at the side (usually left), auto-hiding.

I voted "Other"

I've been experimenting with Unity lately, with the vertical sidebar. Not too happy with it.

Also, I agree resolution matters a LOT!

As someone who's been literally obsessed with this topic for the past years, spent tireless amounts of comparing which desktop metaphor is better and did much research of my own I can only conclude that a panel in the top is the best option for many reasons.

I see most of you just got used to having the panel in the bottom, not because it's convenient or functional, but because it's habit.

Microsoft never properly understood the desktop paradigm, not only with it's crap system, but with the placement of elements on the desktop, whereas Jobs of Apple understood it perfectly clear and built a desktop (Apple OS X) that solved all desktop usability questions in human history and became loved by millions of people, mostly designers, around the world. Why? Because not only it showcases a perfect harmony of elements, but it's mainly functional.

Take it from this perspective: everything you do, every app you interact with has all of its controls in the top of its window. Any web browser is a good example with the File, Edit, View... and other options in the top of the window, mostly the top left; or any other application for that matter, so what this means is, if you have your panel in the top you don't need to travel from one edge of the screen to the other like in Windows having to venture to the bottom of the screen to multitask by selecting another app and then again to the top to choose an option from the app's window and then go to the bottom of the screen again to... this is highly inefficient.

Desktops like Xfce are most productive in this matter, with one panel in the top that is very compact, allowing you to display not only all windows, but also indicators at the same time.

The windows panel is very clunky and can quickly become overfilled with icons and indicators and you cannot have more than one.

Panels on sides can disrupt the way some apps work/display, games in particular, and even though screens are usually wider, they need that working space, even though we are talking sometimes only about a few pixels here and there, but they matter. If you decide to use panels in vertical mode, it's best to use intellihide/autohide.

To conclude this, I'm not an Apple fan and I've never used a single Apple product, but their desktop metaphor is the best, because it can argue in the most productive ways regardless what anyone says. It's why Canonical adopted much of it in Unity.

I like Ubuntu panel

Bottom, mostly out of habit, partially because it's out of the way down there.

ping Inoki - The very first OSX I saw had the bar at the bottom with the AutoZoom Mouseover function. That seemed a brilliant solution but by then I had already spent far too many years in OS/2 with the bar on top. Warp 3 also had a fast access dock at the bottom but once the top bar is properly setup that bottom quick access bar became superfluous.

Before OS/2 I used shells like Norton Commander and PCTools PCShell, all of which had menuitems on top with a list of Fx fast access on the bottom. So, between OS/2 and DOS habituation, today I still use Linux somewhat that way with autohide bar on top and a few common apps like Yakuake, available from Fx buttons.

Mate, LXDE, and XFCE all get set up the same: two panels, one on the bottom, one on the right.

Every few weeks the panel gets moved to the opposite edge, because why not? There's no such thing as correct UI.

I don't always use a GUI, but when I do, I prefer my panel to start at 0+0.

Stay thirsty, my friends.

I voted other, as I don't care where it is as long as I can auto hide it.

no panel here, either
 

I voted other since I don't use a panel as a rule.

I use mostly cli apps, and if I need to launch something graphical, I use dmenu.

Although in tmux I leave the panel on the bottom if I forget to turn it off, but I don't know if that even counts.