Why is Desktop Unity using the global application menu? [closed]

On the one hand, we are making menu's "bigger" and "easier to hit" by using the edge of the screen, as noted in the first answer. On the other, we will actually deprioritise them, by using the panel primarily to show the application name (or window title) and only showing the menu when you mouse towards the panel, or use accelerator keys related to the menu. In that way, we're leading the trend of making menus less central to UI.

Ted Gould blogged some research he did on the use of menu's. Informally, his findings support the idea that menu placement is less an issue as we use them less than we tend to think we do.

This was an important question for us and one we believe is settled in a way that's supported by research. We supported the original pitch to make the global menu a feature of GNOME, which was unfortunately rejected.

First, one of the same reasons Mac OS has always used a global menu applies equally here. One of the key principles -- tautologies, really -- in UI design is that "bigger" things are easier to "hit" with a mouse.

What is less obvious until one thinks about it, is that things on the edges of the screen have infinite height or width (depending on whether they're on a horizontal or vertical edge).

By keeping a menu at the top of the screen, the user only has to "aim" horizontally -- vertically, they need only "throw" the cursor to the top of the screen.

Second, the idea that "Desktop" Unity doesn't need to conserve vertical space is just silly. In recent years, I've used wide-screen 17" laptops with 1920x1200 displays, often with an additional external monitor of the same resolution, and I find myself wishing for more vertical space all the time.

Screen real estate is always at a premium -- not just on netbooks.

Finally, with regard to the remark about usability issues with the distance between the menu and application windows on large screens, I'm not at all certain where that's coming from. Mac OS has been getting along just fine for years, including as my primary desktop environment. There are undeniably implementation issues with the global menu's actual functionality with some apps, and inconsistent or poor design practices have certainly led to some applications relying overly much on menu bars, or laying their menu bars out in strange ways, but these are not fundamental problems with the global menu paradigm.