Using the GNOME Panel is very simple and will come easily to anyone who has used a graphical desktop environment. This section will give you a basic introduction to help you get started, and the following sections will discuss the various panel contents and features in more detail.
The panel can hold several types of objects. Most important of them are application launchers — buttons which start an application when clicked with the mouse, applets — applications which run inside of the panel, displaying information for the user, and menus —. Each of these types is described in detail in the following sections. You can easily add, move, or remove panel objects — see the section called Adding, Moving, and Removing Panel Objects.
To use any of these objects, all you have to do is to click on it with the left mouse button. This will produce the default action for this object: for menus, bring up the menu; for application launchers, launch the corresponding application, for applets, it depends on the applet: some of them do nothing (for example, the clock applet); others will execute some commands when clicked.
For now, a simple example of each panel object will be sufficient to get started. The example panel shown below shows each type of panel object. (YES, I KNOW - WE NEED A DIFFERENT SCREENSHOT).
Figure 1. An Example Panel
Most important of all items shown here is the Main Menu, shown by the stylized footprint icon in the left side of the panel. This menu provides you access to almost all you can do with GNOME — all the applications, configuration tools, command line prompt, Logout and Lock Screen commands, and much more. The main menu is described in detail in the section called The Main Menu.
... The tiger head icon is a launcher, which starts the ... program when clicked. The square gray box with red and green charts in it is the rp3 applet, which activates or ends modem connections, and also plots the data transfer rate when the modem connection is active. PAGER
Clicking on any panel object with the right mouse button brings up the pop-up menu. This menu contains commands for removing or moving the object, and Panel menu, which can be used to change panel properties (both for this panel and global, i.e. for all panels), add an object to the panel, or remove the whole panel. In addition, the pop-up menu also contains some items specific to this object; in most cases, it will contain About, which would show brief information about the applet, such as author's name and version date, Help, and Properties, which allows you to configure preferences and settings for this object.
You can also right-click on the panel itself. This will bring up the Main Menu. In particular, this menu also contains the Panel menu described above.
The left and right arrow icons seen at either end of the example panel are used to hide the panel.
Figure 2. The Hide Button
Pressing the Hide Buttons will hide the GNOME Panel in the direction of the arrow pressed.
You may decide that you want the Panel to hide on its own when you are not using it. This can be a helpful function if you are unable to run your system in a high resolution. You can find out how to auto hide the Panel in the section called Individual Panel Properties.