[Konsole-devel] Review Request: Finer grained choices for X Selection/Clipboard

[Adam Batkin]

> On March 8, 2012, 10:20 a.m., Jekyll Wu wrote:
> > Well, after re-reading and re-considering this wish for some time, I feel that original report is a mixture of two related but different issues:
> > 
> > 1). Users are confused by the difference between Selection and Clipboard in X11. 
> > 
> > 2). Users want the handy feature of "copy selected text into clipboard automatically when using Konsole"
> > 
> > For issue 1), I would say: If a user is confused or annoyed by X11 Selection, the best and easiest solution is just ignore and never use that feature. Do copying and pasting in the same explicit way as in other systems. No unique feature, and no confusion.
> > 
> > For issue 2), It is tricky. 
> >  
> >   First, it is generally problematic by nature. As the reporter and Adam have mentioned, that means "I can't replace the selected text using previously copied text". That would be a big problem for a text editor. However, its impact for Konsole is much smaller or almost zero because you generally do not perform that kind of operation in Konsole. 
> > 
> >   Second, I notice that Adam mostly ignores Selection except when using Konsole. That is interesting. I guess one main reason is when using Konsole you can't copy selected text into clipboard quickly and explicitly using the well known "Ctrl+C" shortcut. You either use mouse to do it from the context menu(which is slow compared to keyboard), or use some shortcut other than "Ctrl+C" (which is also slow because your muscle remembers Ctrl+C much much better).
> > 
> >   So my understanding is that "Ctrl+C" problem is the start point of Adam's suggestion and patch. If so, the patch only needs to introduce one check box : "copy selected text into....".  Then you can use "Shift+Insert" consistently for pasting in Konsole. 
> >   
> >   The extra option for changing the semantic of middle-click-pasting is cool and might be handy(I personally like it), but it is too big a step for only Konsole to provide that unconventional option itself.
> >
> 
> Kurt Hindenburg wrote:
>     Adam, do you agree w/ Jekyll's analyse?  I would tend to agree that having the one checkbox is the way to go for now.

I would agree that a checkbox to copy to the clipboard on selection (in addition to X Selection) would be fantastic, and would make me very happy (let's say 95%).

But back to #1, in my case, it's not just a case of not using that feature. I'd love to do that, but that's not possible. If I explicitly copy some text ("A") to the clipboard in my word processor, but then I highlight some other text ("B") to make it bold, the word processor has overwritten the X Selection, whether I like it or not. Clipboard=A, Selection=B. So now if I middle click in konsole, it pastes B even though I really wanted A.

I'm not confused by the X Selection, I'm annoyed by it. I use too many operating systems on a daily basis to seamlessly make any use of it, since I'm used to being able to highlight text whenever I want, without the fear of it causing any side-effects.

So to make me 100% happy (well, I'd also like a pot of gold, and a few other things), a second checkbox/radio box would be nice, allowing the user to decide where middle-click pastes from: Clipboard or X Selection (the default, since that would follow the Principle of Least Surprise).


- Adam


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On March 6, 2012, 12:48 a.m., Adam Batkin wrote:
> 
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> This is an automatically generated e-mail. To reply, visit:
> http://git.reviewboard.kde.org/r/103861/
> -----------------------------------------------------------
> 
> (Updated March 6, 2012, 12:48 a.m.)
> 
> 
> Review request for Konsole.
> 
> 
> Description
> -------
> 
> * Creates new "Mouse" Profile Options tab with all of the mouse stuff
> * Selected text can now go to X Selection AND Clipboard (instead of ONLY X Selection)
> * Middle-Mouse clicks can paste from X Selection or Profile
> 
> The whole rationale here is that I almost never care about the X Selection (and
> I'm probably not alone). And in the few cases where I DO care, well, that's my
> problem. So this patch leaves all of the defaults as-is (no one will notice a
> change) but for people for whom it makes a difference, now they can control
> what is going on.
> 
> 
> This addresses bug 183490.
>     http://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=183490
> 
> 
> Diffs
> -----
> 
>   src/EditProfileDialog.h c669b7f 
>   src/EditProfileDialog.cpp cbb4875 
>   src/EditProfileDialog.ui 9208009 
>   src/Profile.h 698019b 
>   src/Profile.cpp 5e0a0e2 
>   src/SessionController.h 46714c0 
>   src/SessionController.cpp e937753 
>   src/TerminalDisplay.cpp c26d5a9 
> 
> Diff: http://git.reviewboard.kde.org/r/103861/diff/
> 
> 
> Testing
> -------
> 
> 
> Screenshots
> -----------
> 
> konsole "Mouse" profile configuration tab
>   http://git.reviewboard.kde.org/r/103861/s/436/
> 
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Adam Batkin
> 
>

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