Re: [gtk-list] new file selection box

[Roland Bock <rbock eudoxos de>]

This looks really cool!
Thank you very much for your effort!

I hope it makes it's way into the next distribution!!!


Greetings,
Roland Bock

john@giorgio.hart.bbk.ac.uk wrote:
> 
> Hiya, people with long memories might recall some debate a week or so ago
> about tarting up GtkFileSelection. I've had a stab at it (took *cough* longer
> than I thought), if you're interested, take a peek at:
> 
>         http://giorgio.hart.bbk.ac.uk/~john/gtkfilesel2/
> 
> I'll gather comments/fixes for a couple of weeks, and if I get enough positive
> feedback from gtk gtkurus, I'll submit this stuff as a patch for the official
> distribution. If you have any stuff to add (flames etc. are welcome), email me
> at:
> 
>         john@giorgio.hart.bbk.ac.uk
> 
> Here's the README:
> 
> --
> Rationale:
> ==========
> 
> gtk_file_selection is nice (tab-completion is just great), but the directory,
> filename, and extension are all edited together in one gtk_entry. It's hard to
> change one without changing the others as well.
> 
> For example, an application might pop up a save box and be able to suggest a
> sensible filename (maybe the name of the last thing the user loaded). Now if
> the user wants to click into another directory to save the new version of the
> file there, they are going to destroy the filename and will have to retype it.
> 
> Similarly, with the old gtk_file_selection, you can type *.tif into the entry
> and press tab to see all the .tiff files, but you have to delete the filename
> to do this.
> 
> The idea of this change to gtk_file_selection is to break the old file name
> entry into three separate parts: a directory, a file name and an extension
> set.  You can change them independently and applications can offer sensible
> defaults for them.
> 
> There's a bunch of new stuff to handle files-of-type filtering. You can now
> specify a filter through which all displayed files must pass. The default
> filter (it's really simple) just tests whether a file has one of a set of
> suffixes (eg. ".tif", ".tiff"), where the suffix set is specified by changing
> an option_menu above the dir list. You can specify an alternative filter
> yourself and override these controls if you want to do something better.
> 
> I've made a few other smaller changes too: directory history, single-click
> navigation in file select mode, new refresh function, automatic suffix
> stuff.
> 
> Done:
> =====
> 
> - combo box at top
>   * displays fs->history_list (most recent dir at top)
>   * your app can add useful dirs to fs->history_list (eg.
>     "/usr/local/myapp/tutorial") with gtk_file_selection2_update_-
>     history_menu()
>   * filename completion stuff cleaned up
>   * can use completion in top or bottom entry boxes, improved feedback for
>     non-existent directories etc.
> 
> - new label widget above combo shows current directory and error messages
>   * fs->selection_text is still there is you want to change it
> 
> - in file select mode (ie. GTK_WIDGET_VISIBLE (fs->file_list->parent)):
>   * single click in directory list to change directories
>   * doubleclick does nothing
> 
> - in dir select mode (ie. !GTK_WIDGET_VISIBLE (fs->file_list->parent)):
>   * single click in dir list copies dir name to fs->selection_entry
>   * doubleclick moves into directory
> 
> - use gtk_file_selection2_refresh() to force a reread of all files etc.
>   * if your app has just written a new file, you might want to refresh any fs
>     dialogs on the screen
> 
> - files-of-type option_menu above dir list
>   * hidden by default ... use gtk_file_selection2_show_file_types() and
>     gtk_file_selection2_hide_file_types() to add and remove
>   * use gtk_file_selection2_set_file_types() to set a list of suffixes
>     to allow ... associate a text description with each suffix set.
>     Example:
> 
>        {{"TIFF image files (*.tif; *.tiff)", {".tif", ".tiff", NULL}},
>         {"JPEG/JFIF image files (*.jpg; *.jpeg)", {".jpg", ".jpeg", NULL}},
>         {"All files (*)", {"", NULL}},
>         NULL}
> 
>   * suffix used to select files displayed in file list, provided you've
>     called gtk_file_selection2_set_file_types() and
>     gtk_file_selection2_show_file_types()
>   * case-insensitive, so ".TIFF" will match too
>   * use gtk_file_selection2_set_file_type() to set the current type ...
>     example: gtk_file_selection2_set_type (fs,1); picks show-JPEG-files in
>     the example above
>   * use gtk_file_selection2_get_file_type() to get the current type ...
>     example: returns ".jpg" using example above ... not necessarily the
>     same as the actual file extension!
>   * call gtk_file_selection2_set_filter() to replace the file name filter
>     with one of your own
> 
> - automatic filename extension mangling
>   * only if files-of-type stuff is turned on
>   * example: files-of-type is changed from TIFF to JPEG/JFIF, file name
>     automatically changed from "fred.tif" to "fred.jpg"
> 
> Other stuff:
> ============
> 
> - 'dot' files and directories
>   * as before, add a dot to the end of the pathname and hit Tab to see dirs
>     and files starting with a '.'
> 
> - compatibility
>   * by default, no new stuff visible, except the combo box for pathnames
>   * sizeof (GtkFileSelection2) has grown, but new stuff is all at the end,
>     so we may have binary compatibility, provided users haven't subclassed
>     off gtkfilesel (?is this right?)
> 
> Questions:
> ==========
> 
> - is the single-click-dir-change a good idea? It means the filesel has to
>   behave differently in dir-select mode, which might be confusing.
> - GtkFileSelection2FilenamePredicate is only given file names, not whole
>   paths, and not dirs. Is this a good idea?
> - I decided against adding $NAME expansion, this is maybe confusing and
>   better in the app layer.
> - You can get odd effects with files-of-type stuff. Example: if you have
>   bizarre files called ".tiff.jpg". Is this a problem?
> 
> To do:
> ======
> 
> * click ".." in dir list, move up, leave old current dir selected in
>   new dir list
> 
> * test old API stuff more carefully
> 
> * test fileop stuff
> 
> * live with it a bit and see if it starts to grow or annoy
> 
> Compiling:
> ==========
> 
> Put gtkfilesel2.[hc] into your app src directory, in your app sources
> globally susbstitute:
> 
>:1,$s/gtk_file_selection/gtk_file_selection2/g
>:1,$s/GtkFileSelection/GtkFileSelection2/g
>:1,$s/FILE_SELECTION/FILE_SELECTION2/g
> 
> You'll need to add -I$(GTKHOME) to your cc line as well. This is because
> gtkfilesel2.c is not being compiled in the gtk+ area (as it rightfully
> expects), and it needs to be able to #include "config.h"
> 
> You can add it to your gtk+ area as well (not recommended) if you change the
> #includes at the start of gtkfilesel2.c. There are comments there to guide
> you.
> 
> I've based this on the file_select in gtk+-1.2.1. I've tested it with
> gtk+1.2.0, 1.2.1 and 1.2.2 on solaris and red hat.
> 
> I'll gather comments for a couple of weeks, and if I get enough positive
> feedback from gtk gtkurus, I'll submit this stuff as a patch for the official
> distribution. If you have anything to say (even flames are welcome), email me
> at:
> 
>         john@giorgio.hart.bbk.ac.uk
> 
> Fri Apr 23 15:58:42 BST 1999
> --
> John Cupitt, john.cupitt@ng-london.org.uk, +44 (0)171 930 2108
> VASARI Lab, The National Gallery, Trafalgar Square, London, WC2N 5DN
> 
> --
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