Distinguise more explicit actions like "move" "rename" and "new sub page"

[dotancohen]

Right now the context menu looks like this:
New Page...
Copy Page...
Rename Page...
Delete Page...

This would seem much friendlier:
Copy
Delete
Move
Rename
----
New Page
New Subpage
----
Properties

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

See related bug:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/zim/+bug/269078

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

Actually I think my default file manager has the same behavior. Feels like bloat to have a "move" function next to the "rename" function. Not sure what feels better in terms of concepts, but I would say that you rename notes rather than move them.

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

> I would say that you rename notes rather than
> move them.

That is true if the new and old locations are in the same place of the Index hierarchy. For instance, if all pages are top-level pages, or the old name and the new name are under the same mother page.

However, if a page is to retain it's name yet have a new location in the hierarchy, then it is being moved, not renamed. The term "name" should only refer to the last section of the path, not to the full path itself.

For instance, if one browses his file
system in his file manager to "/home/user/bills/telephone", then renames it to "mortgage" he would expect the path to the file to become "/home/user/bills/mortgage" not "/home/user/mortgage" or even "/mortgage". The same behaviour is expected of Zim. That is why the rename function should not include the path: the path should not change when one is renaming a page. The path should change only when one is moving a page.

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

Seems to me that most file managers do not have an explicit "move" function in the first place. You move using cut and paste from the parent directory. Indeed rename only changes the base name. Also checked in some email clients where you can only move folders by drag and drop.

I agree that it is non-obvious to use rename for moving, but having both "move" and "rename" next to each other still seems redundant. Need to think a bit about how we can change this.

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

Very good, thank you. I urge you to examine other Linux applications that utilize a hierarchal structure and provide a similar convention.

Otherwise enjoying your terrific application!

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

See also bug #297680 for more discussion

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

Users do not realize that to move "/a/b/c" to "/a/b/z" is the exact same thing as renaming "./c" to "./z". Really, this is not so obvious.

> I agree that it is non-obvious to use rename for moving, but having
> both "move" and "rename" next to each other still seems redundant.

Right now the context menu looks like this:
New Page...
Copy Page...
Rename Page...
Delete Page...

This would seem much friendlier:
Copy
Delete
Move
Rename
----
New Page
New Subpage
----
Properties

Sure it is longer, but the user can choose what he needs in one step. He does not need to decide in which supergroup his desired action is found, and what programming jargon describes what he wants (calling rename a move is programming jargon).

The Properties dialog could include item such as an Icon for the page in the tree, a different font colour for the Page Name, a keyboard shortcut to jump to that particular page, and other items. In fact, the Properties dialog could include the Page Title in a text field so that the user could rename the page from inside the Properties dialog (like in a file manager).

> (from bug #297680)
> My main concern is that I want a single dialog that allows to create the user to
> create (or rename) to any namespace in the tree.

From years of using hierarchal managers, I cannot remember a time that I had to rename a page and also move it to a different location in the hierarchy at once. I am certain that there could be such a need, but the possibility to perform such an action should not come at the expense of making the available actions (move/rename) difficult to comprehend (by using the term 'rename' for what users perceive as 'move') or difficult to use (including the full path in the rename dialog).

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

In my opinion bug #297680 should be marked as a dupe of this bug, and this bug should be retitled as a general context-menu cleanup bug.

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

Not sure if I will follow all your recommendations, but at least you
onvinced me to have a close look at this in the redesign.

dotancohen wrote:
> The Properties dialog could include item such as an Icon for the page in
> the tree, a different font colour for the Page Name, a keyboard shortcut
> to jump to that particular page, and other items. In fact, the
> Properties dialog could include the Page Title in a text field so that
> the user could rename the page from inside the Properties dialog (like
> in a file manager).
>

Maybe you could draw how this dialog should look in glade ? Once we have
a design as a glade XML file it is real easy to import into the program.

Thanks,

Jaap

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

> Maybe you could draw how this dialog should look in glade ? Once we have
> a design as a glade XML file it is real easy to import into the program.

Glade was too difficult for me to learn this evening, so I whipped up a prototype in KolourPaint. This is a blatant rip off of the Basket properties menu, mind you. I just took a screenshot, changed the icon, removed the irrelevant items and added some new ones where I saw fit.

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

See also bug #304552 - proposal to change page title on "rename". This will be less intrusive when rename and move are separate actions.

[dotancohen (dotancohen)]

I am tending to agree that Move is redundant as the user can do this via drag and drop, in fact, file managers and email clients (as Jaap points out) only support this method. However, Rename should _not_ include the entire path, it should only work on the current directory, as discussed in the rest of the comments.

An alternative system for moving via keyboard should be devised.

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

Will split out "rename page" and "move page" dialog. For move page I would like a widget allowing to select a namspace graphically instead of expecting users to understand the ":" separated path syntax.

[Jaap Karssenberg (jaap.karssenberg)]

Implemented in the python branch