Basically, I want to try making my own menu/launcher system. For the menu I'd like it to flow like the old drop-down menus (places, applications, administration, preferences etc...) except with a hub and spoke concept. Hover over the "Main Menu" icon and spokes appear with the spoke to the immediate right being highlighted. Turn the hub (sort of like an analogue dial) to rotate the spokes and highlight the different options (places, applications etc..). Selecting an option like applications then changes the text in the hub and the hub icon to "applications" and all the spokes change to the different categories under that heading. Eventually, I'd like for every launcher you put into your panel to be it's own hub offering features. For example: A Firefox hub would have spokes for opening another instance, bookmarks, safe-mode, etc. So, the firefox hub would allow you to open directly to a bookmark. Stuff like that.
I've seen implementations close to this, but instead of the main icon taking on the characteristics of the selected menu item, it flowers out in concentric circles and gets large and cluttered. I'd like a single icon/launcher to take on the properties of the selected item and the spokes to offer various options for the selected item/app. This may not be very good. Especially if I have to make it. But I'd like to try if anyone has any advice.
