[Thunar-dev] Interface thoughts

[Brian J. Tarricone]

Erik Harrison wrote:

>First off, I just wonder if anyone has taken a look at or had the
>opportunity to use the NeXT file manager? If you've used the OS X
>Finder, then you've used it's wimpy brother. You can see some
>screenshots and explication here:
>
>http://www120.pair.com/mccarthy/nextstep/intro.htmld/Workspace.html
>  
>
Hmm.  The first thing that comes to mind when I look at that screenie is 
"wow, this file manager really isn't centered on managing files".  I'm 
sure you can resize it, and the screenie is just sized that way for 
presentation purposes, but still, the "shelf" and that other nameless 
bar under it are really large.  I'm not really sure what the point of 
that second bar is, either, since it appears to just show the hierarchy 
from your current location out to the root, which is redundant if you're 
in the multi-pane mode as shown in the screenie (a mode I'm not really a 
fan of, but that's neither here nor there).

>It's not perfect, and it's UI isn't quite consistent with other apps
>in the GTK+ world, but it's well thought out and powerful.
>Particularly the way it displays the current path. This simultaneously
>acts like a back/forward/up/history like system, while also providing
>an easy way to do stuff that some file managers make hard, like doing
>drag and drop with the current directory. Double clicking on a folder
>in that "history bar" takes you to that folder, but preserves the
>history, until you decend into a different folder, much like a
>browser. This is not only the most powerful history tool I've used in
>a file manager, it is also probably the easiest to learn.
>  
>
Is it really a history tool?  From the description in the writeup you 
linked to:

"Below the Shelf is a small area that shows the current path from the 
top level (the "root" directory, in UNIX terms) to the selected app or 
document. This path is illustrated with icons, and is scrollable (if the 
path is long enough, as it is in the image above), so the file system is 
quite easy to understand in a graphical way."

It appears that it's just a list of folders from the root to where you 
are currently.  From what you're saying, it acts "smart" in that you can 
jump around a bit, and it doesn't change the buttons until you *really* 
go somewhere else.  (Incidentally, this is something GtkFileChooser's 
button bar does just as well, but without wasting so much space to do it.)

>I'd also like to point out that spatial and navigational models are
>not incompatible in the same file manager. Spatial is very easy to
>learn and to do basic tasks with. It also (Like Brian and Steve Jobs
>pointed out) makes the user the janitor. The most recent version of OS
>X puts both models in the Finder, and then makes the moronic mistake
>of making the navigational mode default.
>  
>
One man's moronic mistake is another's brilliant choice ^_~.  Though I 
don't particularly like the multi-pane view, but that's another story.

>If you have a "New Window on open" option, and the ability to disable
>all the toolbars, then you can make a spatial file manager without
>sacrificing users like Jasper, Brian and me. Just make those the
>default
>  
>
Agreed.  I really don't see why we can't do both here.  Hell, even 
Windows does it this way, via Tools->Folder Options, General tab.  You 
can tell it to open new folders in the same or a new window, and from 
the main window, you can enable/disable the treeview.  Voila, it's 
spatial-ish.  I really have no problem with the default being a 
spatial-type mode, with the treeview hidden and new windows being opened 
for new folders, and the view mode set to icons rather than a list view 
(or whatever).  As long as I can tell it to turn on the treeview,and 
then *always* show the treeview when a Thunar window gets opened, 
something Windows Explorer *doesn't* get right, and permanently disable 
the new window behavior, I'll be happy.  Is there something vital I'm 
missing about the spatial interface that makes it difficult to allow 
Thunar to act like either?

    -brian