Thanks for the explanation. I use a similar method: putting applications on their own 'virtual desktop' to create a similar experience. I run Thunderbird in it's own visual workspace and only see my mail when I deliberately switch to that workspace...and I've turned off all Thunderbird's notifications. It works for me because my machine is not resource constrained to a point leaving most applications running is likely to slow other workloads.
"Virtual Desktops" lets me handle my issues with application clutter the same way for every application...social media like HN get their own visual workspaces too. I use the tiling window manager Xmonad. After the learning curve it became easier to use than my distro's (Ubuntu) virtual desktops interface.
Of course all that required changing the way I work. Then again, I guess switching applications would require changing the way I work too.
