Rename in-line vs. rename pop-up

[Marcus Harrison]

On Thursday 21 Jan 2010 21:58:30 Aaron J. Seigo wrote:
> On January 20, 2010, Peter Penz wrote:
> > Using the popup was intended, as I watched people (that I'd see as target
> 
> > user group of Dolphin [1]) having problems with inline renaming:
> i have a hate-love relationship with such dialogs: they have all the
> benefits you note, but are so distracting and create window management
> problems.

I have to agree with this. One thing I particularly dislike about dialogues 
like this is that they feel completely separate from the job they're actually 
doing. Heaven forbid I go off to do something else, I then have to select the 
rename window in alt+tab or from the taskbar, and (especially since I'm using 
a netbook) it just adds clutter to my otherwise quite clean Present Windows.

> 
> i -really- think that an answer to this is the idea of "document modal"
> dialogs so that kwin can place such dialogs "in" the parent window. these
> are also known as "sheets" on MacOS X.

Putting it into Kwin is actually a rather good idea: this would apply to 
open/save dialogues as well across applications, wouldn't it? Despite trying 
to think of situations where this may be problematic (Koffice's frame-settings 
dialogue or KDenLive's render window, for example), I think it would work well 
over-all.

It would also save us the hassle of making sure rename-inline is clear and 
informative without being ugly-as-sin. ;)

> 
> i'll raise this issue again at the upcoming kwin sprint in february.

-- 
Marcus Harrison