[Thunar-dev] user interface ideas

[Matt McClinch]

DINH Viêt Hoà wrote:

>3 - The side pane give the choice for 2 styles : Shortcuts or Tree
>I think we could have a comprise getting advantage of two: you could  
>make them both appear by rooting the tree at the path selected in the  
>shortcuts pane.
>Since shortcuts, most of time, won't use all the space that it is  
>given (I personnally have a few shortcuts (less than 5)).
>And in order to avoid the use of space in the interface, you could use  
>the following layout :
>
> -------------------------
>| Shortcuts |Files        |
>|           |             |
>|           |             |
>|-----------|             |
>| Tree      |             |
>|           |             |
>|           |             |
> -------------------------
>
>  
>
I have created a patch that allows for this kind of layout.  But it does 
not re-root the tree like you mentioned.  For anyone interested, it can 
be found here:

http://filebox.vt.edu/users/mmcclinc/thunar-sidepane.patch

Benedikt made it pretty clear that he does not like this idea, so if you 
want this functionality, you will have to apply the patch yourself.

patch -p0 < thunar-sidepane.patch
make
make install

This patch works for thunar SVN as well as the experimental tarball, 
since the files in question are identical in both versions.

To achieve the above layout, simply enable both sidepanes.  Switching 
from just one to just the other becomes a two-step process (enable one, 
disable the other), but F9 toggling works as expected.

One thing I noticed is that if you have both enabled, and you click on a 
shortcut that points to a hidden directory (or a directory that is 
descended from a hidden directory), the tree pane will not be able to 
locate the directory unless you have enabled "Show Hidden Files."  
Pressing Control+H while it is searching will allow the tree pane to 
find the directory.

Matt McClinch