Re: GMC feedback / comments

["Georg C. F. Greve" <greve gnu org>]

 || On 5 Mar 1999 00:20:19 +0100
 || deman@win.tue.nl (Ronald de Man) wrote: 

 rdm> Are you sure? Also with Windows 95? I'm pretty sure that today at work
 rdm> I moved some documents from a folder onto the desktop and that these
 rdm> were no shortcuts, the documents were really removed from the folder.

O.k. - I am certainly not the man to talk about Windows but someone
told me that the default behaviour is to create links when dragging
stuff unto the desktop. I have never really used Windows so I can't
tell.... .-)

 rdm> True. In this case linking is more natural. And inconsistent dragging
 rdm> behaviour depending on the type of file is probably not what we want.
 rdm> So maybe I should agree with you.

What we probably should go for is the "safest" default behaviour that
may be customized in a way the user likes. That way the "dumb" users
are not in danger while the "smart enough" ones may get any behaviour
they want. We also prevent "hey I lost my important data because you
made it behave so wierd" flames by chosing the safest option as the
default... 

 rdm> A drag and drop from a flopppy to the desktop should (and probably is,
 rdm> I haven't tried it yet) be a copy. So it's pretty much impossible to have
 rdm> really consistent behaviour.

 rdm> Removable media       -> copy

Probably. Although one might live with the "you gotta tell it when to
copy" thing. Of course this might result in a dead end but on a UNIX
system all filesystems are mounted anyways so one can never guarantee
they'll stay there for all time...

 rdm> User files            -> move

I disagree here. I have quite some stuff lying around and it is
distributed within several directories in the smartest way for my
purpose. 
My only reason for putting something on the desktop would be that I am
using frequently on it at the moment and don't want  to go searching
for it... if it get's copied there it'll disrupt the integrity of my
data. Almost everyone uses directories in some way (if you got more
than two tings to work on, that is) and if things get moved instead of
linked or copied by default, it is gonna result in a serious chaos. 

 rdm> System files/programs -> link

Definitely.

 rdm> But I don't dare asking for this :)

:-)

Personally I'd prefer a behaviour like

usual drag and drop	   : Link
drag and drop with shift   : Copy
drag and drop with control : Move

This would make it safe to use drag and drop without knowing about the 
default behaviour but would enable everyone to copy / move things
around easily.

Regards,
		Georg

-- 
Georg C. F. Greve <greve@gnu.org>
If a trainstation is where a train stops, what is a workstation?

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