Ok, I’ll bite.
To use addons as an example, the user enables them, then they show up in the ui, where they are most appropriate & efficiently used & easily accessed. If you no longer want them in the ui, simply disable them after use to reduce ‘clutter’ or collapse the panel, for later reference. I actually went through many addons sometime ago & coded that the addon panels be closed by default to reduce clutter. So I don’t understand your issues with them.
Blender is a complex 3d program & is among the most highly customizable ui’s in any software types.
I wonder how much you look into the ui to see just how much you can do & how much you can hide if you want.
Already in the top header there’s the Screen layouts, with animation & scripting & motion tracking & other layouts, you can build & save your own too, very easily. Hover over the 3d view & press ctrl/up arrow to get full screen mode, you cannot get more simple than that.
Nearly everything in Blender is already context sensitive, if you have a bone selected, the bone tools show up, if you have an mesh selected in edit mode the mesh edit mode tools show up or press ‘T’ & on ‘N’ keys to hide the menu’s for your session, this is really good & uncluttered.
I would say, with respect, to take the time to learn Blender & the tools properly, then you may gain a better understanding of why things do what & why they are where.
Considering that Blender is a powerful feature full application, with most of the tools you need at your fingertips or close by, the developers have done very good job.
To say that or imply that coders just load up the ui is not true in any sense.
There have been UI studies, UI google of codes, ui refactors & any feature added is added in the most appropriate area after consultation with artists & coders alike.
Artists play a large role in developing blender & also in the way the ui functions are layed out, usually these artists have also tested & or requested the feature.
I’m not talking about your hobby artist either. I’m talking about guys & gals that use Blender daily in their production environment, with many of them relying upon it for many years as the major tool in there daily work & income.
Finally, like I did, when Blender went from 2.49 to 2.5x, If you don’t like something, become pro-active & change it yourself.
I did, I disagreed & still do with the spacebar menu becoming the search, I thought it a waste of such a large key, so with help from like minded people, we coded the Dynamic Spacebar menu, which gives you mode sensitive menus & the search.
(no it’s not like the shift/a, in fact, it’s nothing like it.)
edit to clarify: (the ctrl/a menu is included in the spacebar menu)
That’s just my two cent’s worth.
No doubt this won’t be the last ui thread either…