Weekly 51 for Christmas

Topic: Weekly 51 for Christmas (Read 5179 times)

Weekly 51 for Christmas

2014-12-23, 07:47:44

The good news is that incremental mouse gestures have arrived.

The bad news is that the status bar is near-dead. It only displays something on mouseover above tabs.

Quote from: http://otter-browser.org/

Highlights:
mouse gestures support (using right mouse button, no configuration interface yet and file format is subject to change),
allow to set policy for third party cookies,
menu button shown by default when menu bar is hidden.

But the good news again is that it's Christmas. An awesome bunch of features are there now.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #1 – 2014-12-23, 08:42:44

@ersi, they are called weeklies for a reason. ;-)
At times Opera-Next was extremely unstable (sometimes crashing on startup or producing broken UI for multiple releases - like when they introduced acceleration but didn't take into account that someone might enable menu bar and all content was drawn with offset but all mouse events worked as if it was rendered properly :-D), at least under Linux.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #2 – 2014-12-23, 09:53:36

The new "menu" button just awesome.
Wesołych świąt i wszystkiego najlepszego.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #3 – 2014-12-23, 11:13:36

Menu button

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #4 – 2014-12-23, 11:16:12

Mousgestures and menu button, that's awesome!

So only notes and autocomplete in the address bar lacking for me for a complete switch from Opera to Otter!

Keep up the great work and merry Christmas! Wesołych świąt, Emdek!

P.S.: An alternative to the menu button would be to export the menus via d-bus in Linux (I love this in KDE), would that be feasible?

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #5 – 2014-12-23, 18:11:18

Dziękuję. ;-)

Merry Christmas. :-)

@Kirilo, there used to be external path for Qt5 for global menu, but it could be built-in nowadays.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas--Regression with F2/url/enter not opening in new tab

Reply #6 – 2014-12-23, 18:52:13

Up until Weekly #51, I could simply hit F2 button and enter a search string or a URL and then hit enter ;whereupon, the new page would open in a NEW tab. Now when doing such a thing, the new page opens in the CURRENT tab. In Preferences/General/Tabs, "Reuse current tab" is unchecked as it has been in previous versions/weeklies. (note: Shift-F2 works by opening the new page in new tab as it has in the past prior to Weekly #51) Thank you and have a "Merry Christmas!"

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #7 – 2014-12-24, 01:01:53

@treego

I personally asked for more in-the-current-tab behaviour. To open in the new tab from the F2-addressfield, press Shift+Enter. It works precisely the same way in Opera.

Originally Opera used to have a little checkbox on the F2 address field: "Open in new tab", but this was removed somewhere at version 8 or maybe even earlier. Shift+Enter does the job anyway.

And merry Christmas

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #8 – 2014-12-24, 09:33:58

@treego
I never quite understood the F2 behavior. In the current tab it seems to duplicate F8 and in a new tab it seems to duplicate Ctrl+N (or Ctrl+T). Perhaps some people like to browse without the addressbar? Anyway, so in Opera/Presto I rebound F2 to go to nickname, but specifically to new page & go to nickname. You should be able to do the same in Otter. Maybe it helps?

Edit: except what you'd want would of course be new page & go to page in Opera/Presto.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #9 – 2014-12-24, 10:43:24

In very old times (talking about the very dawn of the internet) there were browsers without a permanent address bar. The address field was implemented as a dialogue box. Opera's secondary address field is a remnant of that. Relic I would say

I personally immediately saw its usefulness. For example, the first computers I used had a fairly small screen, so I often set the browser fullscreen. Opera's fullscreen is such that no toolbars and buttons remain visible. This is where the secondary address bar is handy.

It's handy not just for typing in addresses, but also for extracting urls from links. I have this menu item in Opera:

Code: [Select]


[Link Popup Menu]
...
Item, "Edit link" = "Copy link, -2, "urlinfo" & Delay, 200 & Go to page & Delay, 200 & Paste"
...

[Link Popup Menu] means the item is in the menu that opens up when right-clicking a link.

Copy link, -2, "urlinfo" means take the url from the link.

Go to page opens up the secondary address field and Paste puts the url in it. You would not want to use your primary address field for this, would you?

Later I discovered exactly the same function (extract url) was implemented in Elinks out of the box. So, clearly this is not some ultrageeky thing necessary only for me. By the way, Elinks is one such browser that has no primary address bar at all, only address field as a popup dialogue.

Let's hope next year Otter will acquire macros so we can serialise actions like in Opera, and proper fullscreen like in Opera.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #10 – 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Quote from: ersi on 2014-12-24, 10:43:24

I personally immediately saw its usefulness. For example, the first computers I used had a fairly small screen, so I often set the browser fullscreen. Opera's fullscreen is such that no toolbars and buttons remain visible. This is where the secondary address bar is handy.

Sure, but from a user standpoint it'd make more sense if your trustworthy F8 remained functional than to have to remember an entirely different shortcut just for fullscreen use. The Firefox implementation is decent in this regard. Ctrl+L shows the relevant GUI, which otherwise remains hidden.

I don't mean this as an attack on the kind of functionality provided by F2, but I do consider its necessity a long-standing (but very harmless) bug in Opera.

Quote from: ersi on 2014-12-24, 10:43:24

Later I discovered exactly the same function (extract url) was implemented in Elinks out of the box. So, clearly this is not some ultrageeky thing necessary only for me.

I don't see it? Regardless, Elinks lacks some integration with the rest of the graphical desktop. Every graphical browser has Copy Link Address (Opera)/Copy Link Location (Firefox)/Copy Link to Clipboard (Otter). Heck, it's that very functionality you use. Anyway, in Elinks you wouldn't be able to copy a link otherwise.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #11 – 2014-12-24, 16:04:27

Well, it's always possible to press Shift+Enter... ;-)
It behaves exactly the same way as address fields as it uses the same widget (except some extra stuff).
It's good idea to offer it as fallback when there is no address field and action to activate it is triggered (we have some related fallbacks already).

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #12 – 2014-12-24, 17:08:01

Quote from: Emdek on 2014-12-24, 16:04:27

It behaves exactly the same way as address fields as it uses the same widget (except some extra stuff).

Now that's clever.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #13 – 2014-12-24, 19:31:29

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Quote from: ersi on 2014-12-24, 10:43:24
I personally immediately saw its usefulness. For example, the first computers I used had a fairly small screen, so I often set the browser fullscreen. Opera's fullscreen is such that no toolbars and buttons remain visible. This is where the secondary address bar is handy.

Sure, but from a user standpoint it'd make more sense if your trustworthy F8 remained functional than to have to remember an entirely different shortcut just for fullscreen use.

For me they are different functions. In my beginning years of internet usage, I mostly used the address bar only to see where I was when I was beginning to feel a bit lost. This means I used it like the status bar. To go to places I used mostly internet directories, portals, search engines, and bookmarks. Sure I sometimes wrote up an internet address on paper and carried it around until I got access to a computer, then typed it in the address field, but when it gave 404 (which was often), it was always a pain to figure out which step of the way went wrong and how to correct it. Not usually worth it.

When it slowly occurred to me to do more stuff with the address bar, I had already discovered Opera and the secondary address field, which is far more useful for all the extra stuff, so the primary address bar stays in its status-bar like function to show me where I am.

By the way, the widespread shortcut to focus the address bar is Ctrl+L these days. It turns out F8 is not so trustworthy after all.

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

I don't mean this as an attack on the kind of functionality provided by F2, but I do consider its necessity a long-standing (but very harmless) bug in Opera.

I call it a cherished relic. And Otter has done well to implement it again

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Quote from: ersi on 2014-12-24, 10:43:24
Later I discovered exactly the same function (extract url) was implemented in Elinks out of the box. So, clearly this is not some ultrageeky thing necessary only for me.

I don't see it?

Should be E (i.e. Shift+E) out of the box. The elinks.conf code for it is "goto-url-current-link". It lifts the url from the link and displays it in the goto dialogue.

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Regardless, Elinks lacks some integration with the rest of the graphical desktop.

What integration should it have? I mean, it's a console browser...

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Every graphical browser has Copy Link Address (Opera)/Copy Link Location (Firefox)/Copy Link to Clipboard (Otter). Heck, it's that very functionality you use. Anyway, in Elinks you wouldn't be able to copy a link otherwise.

Ah, I see. You mean copy to clipboard. This is not what I meant. My idea is to display (and edit) rather than copy to clipboard.

My "Edit link" in Opera is meant precisely to edit urls, not to copy them. To me it's an undesirable side-effect that it goes via clipboard in Opera. Elinks steers clear from this defect. But by passing the link to xclip you can make Elinks to copy to clipboard too.

In this context, let me mention also a missing feature in Opera. Opera has Copy link, -2, "urlinfo" where "urlinfo" means the url. It also implies that there should/could be things like "titleinfo", "targetinfo", "textinfo" and whatever can go into anchor tags.

FF has its "Copy link text" extension. Opera should have been able to do it out of the box.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #14 – 2014-12-24, 21:10:47

Quote from: Frenzie on 2014-12-24, 13:45:19

Sure, but from a user standpoint it'd make more sense if your trustworthy F8 remained functional than to have to remember an entirely different shortcut just for fullscreen use. The Firefox implementation is decent in this regard. Ctrl+L shows the relevant GUI, which otherwise remains hidden.

To give a different argument for my point of view, when in proper fullscreen mode, it never occurred to me that the same toolbars, fields and buttons should still be accessible.

I mean, the toolbars are invisible in fullscreen, and I made them invisible by entering fullscreen mode, so the most natural way to get the toolbars back is to leave fullscreen mode. This is how the fullscreen mode is a whole different function for me.

Right-click menus and popup dialogues are another story. Those should remain as they are.

Of course, I am fully in favour that users should be able to define the toolbars that they can access or to leave visible in fullscreen mode. What I think we can agree on is that users should be able to customise, and that Otter's fullscreen is inflexible as it is. And I am sure everybody agrees that toolbars that pop up from behind the screen edges and make the entire webpage jump are utterly undesirable.

My personal preference is to have no toolbars anywhere in fullscreen mode. If I ever wanted a toolbar visible in fullscreen mode, it would be a custom toolbar designed specifically for fullscreen mode, not any of the ordinary toolbars. Opera made even this possible.

One way to solve this is to give actions some context. For example Opera has in Preferences > Advanced > Shortcuts > [Pick a keyboard setup] > Edit "Input context and shortcuts" which categorise actions by "Application" (i.e. global), "Document window" (i.e. when in webspace), "Mail window", "Compose window" etc. Otter could have a separate context for e.g. Fullscreen, Textarea, etc. where users can define actions specific to that context. The problem here is to figure out the contexts correctly from the beginning. It will only work when the idea makes perfect sense to the developers and they see the end-result clearly.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #15 – 2014-12-25, 12:57:34

@ersi, idea of context specific shortcuts is tempting but seems to be "too unique" (I'm afraid that it could lead to confusion) and kind of complicated.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #16 – 2014-12-25, 20:05:56

As I indicated, such context categories are present in Opera. Also in Elinks there are keybind contexts such as Main mapping, Edit mapping, and Menu mapping. But of course, if the idea is foreign to you, it's better to not go that way.

Re: Weekly 51 for Christmas

Reply #17 – 2014-12-25, 21:06:57

@ersi, I'm more concerned that it will be foreign to users and will end up with reports about real bugs (as it's easy to break stuff this way) and features being reported as bugs.