It is fascinating how we throughout our inventions get stuck in almost single minded way of doing things. We seem so sure that we have found the best solutions to things. For example keyboards, which hurt people all over the world, are all flat! There have been invention with rounded keyboards (possibly not very practical), which are much better for your hands, but it didn't catch on. Many examples are of us, the users, sticking to inferior ways of doing things. Why? Because we like what we know, and to change it takes something spectacular!

BumpTop, I am sorry to say, is nothing spectacular.  However much we are in need for better tools to manage our computers, BumpTop is most likely not it!  But it is oh so much fun that it warrants a post.

Overview

The software creates a "desk" on your desktop where you can play with your files, photos and sticky notes. You have almost total freedom, moving them around, stacking them, spreading them, making them larger or smaller, throwing them up on the wall and sending them out into the world via Facebook, Twitter or email.

Watch this video to get a better idea how it works:

As you can see this is wonderful to look at, and for touch screens (computer pads) this might even become popular one day. I also love the idea of changing my screen into a virtual desk.

Sadly, this will not make me want to use it on regular basis!

Free vs. Paid

The free version is very limited as it doesn't even allow creation beyond 2 sticky notes. Most of the nice file maneuvers are only available in the purchased version, along with having access to USB or drives.

Files are not on your Desktop

Most people do not use their desktop for files beside possibly few short cuts and recent downloads, and experts advice not to save files to your Desktop location, but rather in My Document. As I follow these guidelines I found myself with about 20 files on my virtual desk to play with!

Space

I could change my way of working to accommodate the fact that I am now working on my desktop, but it wouldn't help much as the virtual desk is simply too small. If I were to have a virtual desk on my desktop I would have it one of those with hundreds of drawers. It would be a nice looking mahogany desk where I could easily open up drawer (a folder) to work with my papers in there. I could lay them out and flip through them and so on and so forth. When finished I would simply put them back in the drawer.

The BumpTop is full after you have placed 20 files on there. Yes, surely you can pile them and do all sorts of things, but you can't really make them disappear, or in other words, you can't file them away!

CPU

With my few files BumpTop is taking up 90 CPU which is way way way too much for an application that in essence is supposed to be running 24/7 on your computer.

Conclusion

BumpTop is pretty application which you can have fun with.  If you should be so lucky to own a TouchPad it migth even be useful (almost like turning your desktop into iPod).  The bottom line though is that it is not very helpful for heavy users of computers.