Gnome Save As dialog's "Recently Used" does not include directories

[positivek]

Binary package hint: evince

When using the Save A Copy function in Evince (or Save As in other apps), I see that the "Recently Used" selection in the "Places" column on the left only lists filenames that have been used before in saving. It should prioritize showing the recently used *directories* instead of or in addition to the filenames.

I use a workflow similar to what is described in bug 151079. That is, I might be downloading several documents, reviewing each, and if they are useful, I will "Save a Copy" to a local directory. I think bug 151079 is right that the save-as dialog should retain the last-used directory as the initial location so I can simply press "Save" to put the copy in the right location.

However, I actually have a handful (2-3, often) directories that I would like to store these files that I downloaded and viewed. I see the "Recently Used" as acknowledgement that most-recently-used (MRU) lists are a useful tool for providing links to documents and locations. Never in using Evince, though, have I actually saved over another copy of an existing pdf. This might be useful for some, but much more useful to many (I imagine, and certainly for me) would be the case where I save to the same directories over and over again.

** The Recently Used list, therefore, should present some kind of list of MRU directories. And, corresponding to the bug 151079, the top of the list should be the initial location of that Save a Copy dialog. **

I believe this problem is not specific to Evince, but is a problem with Gnome's Save As dialogs in general.

I see that the Recently Used list seems to be shared around Gnome and that it is filtered in the dialog box by file type. Given that this filter does not filter out directories in the other views (e.g. home dir), it would not be inconsistent behavior.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: amd64
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 8.10
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/evince
Package: evince 2.24.1-0ubuntu1
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: evince
Uname: Linux 2.6.27-11-generic x86_64

[positivek (anonyhole)]

It would be nice if the Gnome Save As dialog utilized the "History" that is available in the Nautilus file browser (see attachment).

The Nautilus browser seems to have access to MRU directories (more generally, places/URIs). This History is available in the Nautilus "Side Pane". However, this Side Pane does not seem to be available in the Save As dialogs.

[positivek (anonyhole)]

In fact, if the MRU list of directories was somehow part of the "Save in folder" drop-down menu-list, then I would rarely need to use the full/extended Save As dialog that shows up when the "Browse for other folders" arrow is turned down (revealed/expanded). That would be even more ideal to skip looking at file lists completely.

Again, I think this is a Gnome bug, not Evince particularly.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

according to http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=478193 that's an application bug not a gtk+ one and should be filed upstream at bugzilla.gnome.org in the product of the application in question, thanks.

[Pedro Villavicencio (pedro)]

and it turns out that it was a gtk issue: http://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=548467 forget previous comment.

[Damien Lecan (dlecan)]

This issue should track this but instead : https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=593793