Galaxy View UI

To the average person, the idea of a cluttered yet organized chaos is more than just a metaphor – it’s daily life. We see this every day with our physical desktops in our offices; we each have our own methods of keeping files organized that on the surface may appear chaotic. Yet many of us can find our things with a quick visual search, or at least locate the pile or collection where a certain file or folder is most likely to reside. Computer desktops have attempted to tap into this sort of organized chaos by introducing user interface controls like docks, iconographic desktops, and infinitely large folder trees.

But all of these interfaces fail to allow users to organize their programs and files in a way that is natural and flexible for them. With our proposed interface, Galaxy View, we seek to capture the essence of the organized chaos metaphor while letting users build their computer organization exactly how they wish to do so. If they want just four documents, they can have just four documents. If they want to insert bins and create more complex hierarchies of files, they can do that. But the ways in which they navigate and interact with their computer contents are natural, familiar, novel, and powerful.

For our project, we sought to address a hugely complex problem with a solution that oozes creativity. Despite our limited time period, we have created a set of philosophical design decisions that create a new way of interacting with a personal computer for the masses. Though our proposal only exists at this point in sketches and simple, non-moving mock-up images, we have incorporated strong visual design principles and leveraged our distinct backgrounds to introduce a new paradigm for computing.

The Galaxy View concept was developed by Brian Zaik, Luis Lluberes, and David Watson. The project was initiated within Patricia Search's Visual Design Theory and Applications course at RPI.