KFileDialog: "Parent Folder" button

[Peter Penz]

Aurélien Gâteau wrote:
> Peter Penz wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > Pretty much Gwenview and Dolphin users requested having a kind of "Go 
> > Up"/"Parent Folder" functionality for the URL navigator.
> > 
> > I've just committed a patch on trunk and it seems to work quite well.
> But now 
> > the "Parent Folder"-button in KFileDialog is not required anymore, as
> this 
> > button is already part of the URL navigator.
> 
> It's definitely better with this button, but I remember we had a 
> discussion about adding a button to reveal the hidden part of the url.
> You can find this discussion here:
> 
> http://lists.kde.org/?l=kde-usability&m=121175040002025&w=2
> 
> I still think it would be a nicer solution than the up button, because 
> it provides a way for the user to know where he actually is.

I played around having a button to reveal the hidden part of the URL, as this was also my preferred solution. But it did not work as well as I expected it:

* The icon is one minor but tricky problem. I tried using a '<' arrow, but then the URL looks like this '< Pictures > 2008 > January'. It's not obvious that '<' reveals the hidden parts.

* The reveal-hidden-part-button is no solution to the problem when being in the editable state of the URL navigator. By having an up-button this issue is solved too in a nice way.

* I did no tests with other users yet, but in my personal usecases I really just wanted to go up one hierarchy (e. g. from my home-directory to /home to visit another user). With the up-button I just click the button once, by having the reveal-hidden-part-button two clicks are required (and for the second click I need to move the mouse to hit the correct folder).

So I'm not sure whether the reveal-hidden-part button is  really better. I'll blog about this issue during the next week, maybe the feedback gives a rough indication about the preferred approach :-)

Bye,
Peter
 
> Aurélien