Comment by ToyKeeper

I've been using approximately the same desktop setup for ages, and yet, it often still feels like I'm living in the future because mainstream desktops still haven't really adopted some of the best features, and in some ways are moving backward. This is kind of a disorganized laundry list, but ...

For one, the ability to change how the desktop itself works while it's running, without restarting it... modifying the code on the fly. And if I manage to crash the window manager or some other desktop component, easily just restart it without having to log out or restart all the other programs.

And being able to pretty easily run and manage hundreds of windows. Log in, open one desktop for each project, and just leave it running until the project is done. Maybe reboot for upgrades once every year or two, but otherwise no disruptions.

NO DISRUPTIONS. I don't even have the underlying plumbing installed for notifications and stuff like that. They can try to interrupt me, but they'll find those API calls aren't plugged in to anything.

Freely mixing and matching tiled and floating windows, each of which can be its own tab group with multiple arbitrary windows sharing the same frame. Super handy having free-form placement and grouping of absolutely anything.

No minimized windows. No task bar. No icon tray. No desktop full of icons underneath the windows. The entire screen is one big canvas, to be used however you like. If you need more space, just hit a key to open another desktop.

Manage nearly everything with a keyboard. Mouse usable but not required.

Sloppy focus, of course. (i.e. focus follows mouse, but stays focused if mouse "falls out" of a window into empty space) Not click-to-focus. And definitely no raise-on-click or raise-on-focus.

Mouse keys built into the keyboard, for clicking, scrolling, and moving. Mouse warp too, to teleport the cursor, like having two mouse cursors and a key to swap between them.

A full set of launcher hotkeys which are easily configured and managed by making short shell scripts. Like, F1 to F12 run scripts from ~/bin named like "f1" to "f12", and "shift-f1" and "ctrl-f1" and "shift-alt-f1" and "hyper-shift-ctrl-f1", etc... if a script exists, the key is mapped. Ideally just symlink the named key to a program or script with a more descriptive name, like "shift-f3 -> open-todays-journal-in-vim.sh" or something like that. Easy to see exactly what each key does, with a "ls -l" or similar. (can send a normal f1-f12 event by holding Fn and hitting a number key or the two keys next to the numbers, but I barely ever have a reason to)

Network transparency for everything, of course. It's wild that newer desktops have chosen to remove such a useful feature.

Work at my desk with a notebook to either side, all using a single keyboard+mouse... just slide the cursor off one screen and onto the next. Pick up a notebook and move to the living room. Use its keyboard+mouse to control the notebook plus the television, in much the same way... slide the cursor off one screen and onto the next. Pack up and go to a coffee shop. Control the remote home computers from the local notebook, using their running desktop session. Or run programs natively on several remote computers, with the windows all opened together on one desktop on the notebook.

Automate inputs easily, whenever desired. Record and play macros which work in any program.

Configurations revision-controlled and synced across all my devices, privately, without any data leaking to a corporate cloud.

Organize data into a rich set of nested topic directories or project directories, instead of organizing things by file type into places like "~/Pictures", "~/Documents", etc.

But also, a directory for each day, to hold all the other misc stuff which doesn't fit elsewhere. And a key to easily access it.

Shell scripts can easily know what program I'm using in the GUI, and what directory the focused program is working in, so scripts can take context-sensitive actions.

Automatic private logging of what I do, with easy time tracking and arbitrary queries, using simple plain text log files which are small, easy to grep, and easy to build custom tooling around.

Human-readable plain text everywhere. Plain text files are versatile, powerful, portable, compact, timeless, accessible, and future-proofed.

No churn. No need to retool every few years. Long-lived tools which are mature and robust. Maybe not the flashiest or most fashionable tools, but "bells and whistles" and "useful life" are typically at odds with each other.

A rich vocabulary of small, simple tools which each do one thing well... makes for a powerful, expressive world of deep functionality thanks to the power of language. It empowers the user to do anything they can express. But a small set of huge tools, while initially a bit easier, tends to quickly become limiting and stifling.

I think a lot of the "right answers" for interface design have been figured out for a long time. That is not to say new interfaces are bad... but anything which throws out the old battle-tested solutions in favor of something radically different is going to take a long time to reach anywhere near the same level of usefulness.