Re: Spring Loaded Folders Reloaded

[Darryl Rees <rees netnam vn>]

Curtis Hovey wrote:

> On Fri, 2003-02-28 at 12:43, Alexander Larsson wrote:
>  
>
> > On 28 Feb 2003, Christophe Fergeau wrote:
> >
> >    
> >
> > > > However, looking at the Apple latest patent [1], it is clear that the 
> > > > patch would make Nautilus violates claim 1 of that patent.
> > > >        
> > > To my eyes, the more sensible thing to do with respect to patent is to
> > > never read any so that you can say you didn't know about it if there is
> > > some problems :)
> > > Moreover, this apple patent is probably valid in a few countries, and I
> > > don't think it's really fair to reject this patch because it's illegal
> > > in the us (and maybe a few other countries). You can #ifdef it out in
> > > the problematic countries if you want to be safe :)
> > >      
> > That would mean you can't distribute nautilus.
> >
> > > From the GPL:
> > 7.  If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent 
> > infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues), 
> > conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or 
> > otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not 
> > excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot distribute 
> > so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and 
> > any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not 
> > distribute the Program at all. For example, if a patent license would not 
> > permit royalty-free redistribution of the Program by all those who receive 
> > copies directly or indirectly through you, then the only way you could 
> > satisfy both it and this License would be to refrain entirely from 
> > distribution of the Program.
> >
> >    
>
> Thanks.  I wish I had remembered to check the license when I first
> mentioned the patented issue and distribution complications.  I knew
> there were real legal complications and I stopped after reviewing the
> list archives.
>
> I hope all is not lost.  I think this feature is valuable, and I we can
> improve it (innovate it) so that there are no patent issues.  The
> behaviour, restated in hopes of seeing an alternate implementation, is
> that a gesture involving a selection of objects in nautilus will display
> something that will help navigate the folder hierarchy using only
> gestures.  I believe someone suggested displaying the tree instead of
> opening folders.  And now that I think of it, Spring Loaded Folders are
> never easy to navigate up the tree.  While hovering over a folder seams
> natural to me (wanting to move, but hesitating) as a means to display a
> helper, I'm not sure that is intuitive when you want the files to go
> outside any desktop folders.
>
>  
Another alternative idea. Press a particular hotkey at any time (not 
necessarily while dragging and dropping) while hovering over a folder to 
create a temporary window with the contents of the folder. You could 
also use this to open a file down a deep heirarchy without moving the 
nautilus 'current directory'...

This would be unrelated to dragging and dropping (although usable in 
that case, of course), and so close to zillions of other old ui 
techniques there couldn't possibly be a patent on it :-)

Just an idea.

Darryl.