unresizeable bookmark-window (undecorated)

Bug #366438 reported by Stefan Wagner
4
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
firefox-3.0 (Ubuntu)
Won't Fix
Undecided
Unassigned
firefox-3.5 (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Low
Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: firefox-3.0

I want to add a bookmark, open the bookmark menu, select 'add bookmark' (Lesezeichen hinzufügen [de_DE]) and where in former times a window opened a very much too small window opens.

And isn't resizeable. Why?

I liked to take a screenshot, but it vanisches when I hit something else. Why? To annoy me? What's wrong with resizeable dialogs? You may open it as far as you like.

You could use an unresizeable window if you use this algorithm (pseudocode):
        y = bookmark.size * fontheight < height ? bookmark.size * fontheight : Desktop.getHeight

This way you may resize the window so that it will not be bigger than it needs to be, and not bigger than the Desktop.

When you like to add something to the bookmarks, there is much sense in concentrating on that task, and to give the user as much information as possible - not to restrict the user, as if you like to discourage the user from using the bookmarks.

xUbuntu 8.04 (LTS), Ff 3.0.9

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Sat Apr 25 00:39:07 2009
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 8.04
Package: firefox-3.0 3.0.9+nobinonly-0ubuntu0.8.04.1
PackageArchitecture: i386
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=/home/username/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/opt/mini/jcontrol/bin
 LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: firefox-3.0
Uname: Linux 2.6.24-23-generic i686

Tags: apport-bug
Revision history for this message
Stefan Wagner (wagner-stefan) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Charlie Kravetz (cjkgeek) wrote :

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. We are sorry that we do not always have the capacity to look at all reported bugs in a timely manner. There have been many changes in Ubuntu since that time you reported the bug and your problem may have been fixed with some of the updates. Has this issue been fixed for you?

Changed in firefox-3.0 (Ubuntu):
status: New → Incomplete
Revision history for this message
Stefan Wagner (wagner-stefan) wrote :

It's the same behaviour on firefox 3.0.18 which I updated just 5 Minutes ago and is the current version for 8.04 LTS xUbuntu.

On my other machine, running 9.10 with firefox 3.5. the problem is the same. And it's not just this program, but it seems to be a broken design-principle, to make windows
 - small
 - unresizable

I have two suggestions - no - three.
a) calculate the longest line.length and the number of rows*line.height. An approximated value will suffice, because for small values, the minimum-with will exceed the calculated value, for longer/more lines, the approximated value will be good, and if it is a little too long or short, it doesn't matter much. For example, with the current settings, the minimum size might be 500x300 for the dialog window. There are 50 lines of height 10 and the longest line has 50 chars, multiplied by 9 => 450 px.
Width 450 is smaller than the minimum, so we take the miinimum, 500px.
The height is bigger, so we take the 500px calculated. Check, if the user-display allows for 500x500px and use it. Else don't exceed the user-display.

b) Make the window resizeable though.

c) Make this a design-principle. If a bigger window would fit all the data, make a bigger window (if it will fit to the screen). Allways make it resizeable. Never make it modal. I find those sweet-and-(too)-small-windows in every second application. Try it yourself.

Thanks for your time.

Revision history for this message
Stefan Wagner (wagner-stefan) wrote :

Correction:

On my other machine, running 9.10 with firefox 3.5.8 ...

Revision history for this message
Charlie Kravetz (cjkgeek) wrote :

Thank you for testing further. I can now reproduce this issue in firefox-3.5.8 and in lucid with firefox-3.6 by right-clicking on a tab, left-clicking on "Bookmark This Tab". The bookmark window that opens is fixed in size, and you must scroll to read the data for most items. Unfortunately, Firefox-3.0 has reached end of support, and will not be fixed. Also, please be aware that Xubuntu 8.04 reaches end of support in April 2010.

Changed in firefox-3.0 (Ubuntu):
status: Incomplete → Won't Fix
Changed in firefox-3.5 (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
importance: Undecided → Low
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