Comment 15 for bug 32484

That would work -- selecting the largest free space if no free space is already selected.

Two situations could still arise that would need handling:

A) The user had pre-selected a file system with a partition.

      In this case the "New" menu and toolbar button could be disabled.
      OR
      A warning dialog could be presented.

B) The disk device had no free space remaining.

      In this case the "New" menu and toolbar button could be disabled.
      OR
      A warning dialog could be presented.

These options seem like a lot of work for not much gain.

I tend to prefer the way that PalmOS handled menus and buttons. These were not greyed out or disabled at any time. Instead if a user clicked on a button or selected a menu and the action was not valid, then the user was prompted with what to do so that the menu or button would work.

To apply this PalmOS way to the user pressing the "New" button we have four scenarios:

1) Free unallocated space selected but no partition table on device

     Show dialog indicating to create a new partition table.

2) No partition or area selected

     Show dialog indicating to select free unallocated space.

3) Existing partition selected

    Show dialog indicating to select free unallocated space.

4) Free unallocated space selected

    Proceed as currently to create new partition dialog.

This method would follow the PalmOS philosophy, but is not in alignment with the GNOME HIG regarding control or menu sensitivity.
http://developer.gnome.org/hig-book/3.2/controls-sensitivity.html.en
http://developer.gnome.org/hig-book/3.2/menus.html.en

In fact enabling any control when it is not yet valid is a violation of the GNOME HIG. When I think of this problem in this way, this request is for a violation of the GNOME Human Interface Guidelines, or at least my interpretation of these guidelines.