The State Of The GTK+ File Selector

Anonymous BillyGoat writes "The next stable release of GTK+ (from the 2.4x series) will have a new file selector, and of recent, a lot of activity has been going on around that. One of the GNOME artmasters, Tigert, has released a mockup of the new file selector and the GTK developers are busy working towards that. Meanwhile the people from OSNews have some other ideas, while an OSNews reader has made even better mockups."

Comments

Re:I really liked the original version better

[Anonymous Coward]

At least it was standard across the majority of Windows 3.1 applications, instead of 1/2 of the GNOME/KDE applications.

Re:I really liked the original version better

[ethx1]

I think it is funny how a lot of Linux programmers really depise Microsoft and its products yet we keep seen all these gui "improvements" that borrow from Windows. The mockup by tigert with the commmonly used folders on the left pane is from is from XP (maybe 2000). I am not a Bill Gates fanboy or anything, just something that I noticed.

Re:I really liked the original version better

[0x0d0a]

Really, almost the entire GUI paradigm has been copied around by all parties involved. Some of this is because it works pretty well, and some of it because people get familiar with working a particular way and don't want to change. Ever since the original Mac, the desktop user interface hasn't changed all that much.

I think this is a good thing. It'd be terribly annoying if UI ideas were patented and we had to have a bunch of half-assed environments.

Note to flamers

[arvindn]

Everyone please read this before you start flaming.

The last /. article about the new file selector was filled with "this is totally stupid", "this is worse than the old file selector", "this is the last chance they have to fix it, and they've royally screwed it up", "usability experts, bah! This is why gnome will never catch up with kde" etc.

Now listen. The change that's happenning in the new file selector is primarily that they're creating a new API. Got it? The programming API. That's why the screenshots looked the same. The screenshots tell you nothing. As long as the API doesn't suck the front end can be freely changed without breaking anything, and everyone can do their own mockups and various ideas can be tried and the experts can weigh in with their opinions and so on. This can go on for a long time, and the front end will stabilize when it has reached (near) perfection.

I can't agree

[0x0d0a]

So a next-generation save/open box should include comprehensive network protocol support.

With all due respect, I think that this is a really, really awful idea. Unfortunately, Microsoft has traditionally taken this approach (for political, not engineering reasons). The KDE project, which takes a very Windows-like approach to a number of architecture decisions, copied their approach, and GNOME has come uncomfortably close.

The reason why I'm not a fan of implementing network transparency at the KIOSlave or GNOME-VFS or whatnot layers is that this sort of functionality is *not* KDE or GNOME or whathaveyou specific. It just isn't part of the desktop environment. It should be implemented at a lower level, so that *all* programs running on the machine can take advantage of the functionality. There are a couple of projects that do this -- take a look at LUFS for a proper (IMHO, of course) implementation of what you're asking for.

Where is the pathname?

[spitzak]

Why can't they put in ONE text field with the entire pathname, so it can be cut & pasted, and it can be easily examined and compared to another file in an email or other source, and it is obvious how to type in a pathname?

This can't be that hard, really. I did it ten years ago in a NeXT file chooser I wrote.

Have a SINGLE text field. Anything before the last '/' is the "current directory" and anything after is the "current file". Then add all the buttons and tab completion and scrolling list. As the user edits the text, update the display to match. As the user hits the buttons, re-edit the text.

I consider this obvious and I am dumbfounded that nobody seems to be doing this even today.

I don't care if Grandma is confused by pathnames. Grandma is also confused by insertion-editing of text fields but nobody seems to be trying to make it overwrite.

Show a little incentive, and do this right!

Hall of Shame

[cryptoluddite]

I wish gnome developers would study the UI Hall of Shame and fix the many glaring UI problems -- then gnome would be a really nice desktop.

Consider:

• The main point of a file selector is to choose a file. In the mock-up, only 22% of the dialog's space actually shows files compared to XP where 60% of the space is used for files. And honestly, a lot of the 22% is wasted in the GTK mockup. Defaulting to 'list' instead of 'small icons' doesn't help.
• There is lots of empty space next to the cancel/open buttons and 'send to' checkbox that is just wasted (see XP for how to do it right and still look appealing).
• Having 'Show All Files' button next to the filename field means there is less space to see the filename or type in a path into that field.
• the 'up' button is located about as far away from the files as possible, ensuring lots of extra mouse movement. There is no 'back' button.
• The 'shortcuts' list takes up lots of space and looks terrible when shortcuts with short and longs names are mixed, like in the example. Please tell me it doesn't resize with the window!

I use gnome instead of kde (on gentoo) but the lack of any UI sense is frustrating. Another example: the gnome-panel buttons grow to be unbelievably large if there are only a few windows open. This just looks terrible and combined with the layout problems make it nearly impossible to have a vertical or expanding bar that doesn't just look disgusting.

I really think linux is set to take off on the desktop this year, but these usability/aesthetic details can really have a large negative impact.

Who needs innovation?

[Paul d'Aoust]

You know, I have no problem with 'innovation' being touted as an absolute virtue. Yes, innovation is good, and it's always nice to develop new, more efficient ways of doing things, but... what if something already works fine? Why not copy from someone else if their idea is great? I sorely wish the GTK+ file selector has shortcuts, and I was ecstatic when I installed KDE 3.0 a year ago and found out they had added them in.

Innovation isn't the important thing. Usefulness is. Innovation is only one of the many tools used to create something useful.

'New Folder'???

[MyFourthAccount]

It's pretty funny that the 'even better' mockups have a 'New Folder' button on a 'Open File' dialog box.

Surely the intention of this button is to make absolutely 100% sure that the user can select a file that doesn't exist. I mean, what other file could a user possibly want to open?

There is simply no better file to open then the one that remains in a directory that doesn't exist yet.