[DVDpedia 4.5.3] move/copy/alias and collection issues/ideas

[sjk]

[This was originally intended as a followup to issues being discussed in Film Diary; start there for context. Posted under Bug Reports even though it includes suggestions; move it if you want to, Bruji.]

I see now that I should have copied, then pasted the original entries rather than dragging them.

SUGGESTIONS: I wouldn't mind having an explicit Duplicate command, like File > Duplicate (Command-D) in Finder. And being able to use Option-Drag to create unique duplicate copies of items in other collections.

BUG(?): Also, there's this black arrow that always appears in the corner of items dragged over a collection:


(sorry for the cruddy image)

That's always confused to me because it looks like Finder's alias-creation indicator but appears when items are actually being moved between collections.

Here's an interesting scenario, with at least one bug and suggestion thrown in:

Use File > New Collection from Selection (Shift-Command-N) to create a new included collection from items selected from the built-in excluded Wish List collection. Rename the new collection to something more permanent, e.g. Must See.

Now the real fun begins …

BUG: Select Wish List in the sidebar, then right-click Must See. A focus ring will appear around Must See, but commands under the context menu are still applicable to Wish List (e.g. Include Collection in Library).

CONFUSION/BUG(?): Select Must See in the sidebar and either open the menubar File menu or right-click to view the context menu. Notice Exclude Collection from Library in the list, but Exclude Collection from Wish List would be more accurate. However, if you create another included collection from items selected in Must See then it still has references to those items in Wish List. So, which collection would that new collection be excluded from?

SUGGESTION: Backtracking a bit, if I want to more items from Wish List to also be in Must See there doesn't seem to be any way to do it other than creating a temporary included collection from Wish List, dragging "aliased" items from it into Must See, then removing the temp collection. What I'd like to do is Option-Command-Drag from Wish List to Must See, with that black arrow shown above appearing in the corner to indicate the items are being "aliased" from one collection to another. There could also be a Finder-like green-circle '+' indicator when Option-Drag copying items, if that were supported (as suggested earlier).

Partly derived from comments/examples above, here's a brief summary of general areas for improvement:

• Easily move/copy/alias items, with clear indication of the action, between one or more included/excluded collections
• Easily differentiate when identical looking duplicate items are are aliases vs. unique copies
• Easily identify which collection(s) items are in (workaround: include Collection Names in View Options) and any connections between collections

Hope that mostly makes sense. Certain things are tough to describe in a relatively short space and with enough detail to understand.

[sjk]

No feedback, anyone?

[Conor]

I have it on my immediate do list to sit down to think about the entire flow of the drag can be improved and fix the bugs with the new collection for selection. The alias arrow also means link so we use it for normal collections where a new link to an movie is created after a drag (it's not an actual move as the movie remains in the old collection as well). iTunes does use the green plus to suggest adding to a collection and have already updated the beta to use the same metaphor (the closer we stick with iTunes the less the learning curve). Also over excluded collection the plus is lost and it's just the regular arrow to reflect a move. Another fix is it does not highlight when moving over smart collections as those don't take drag input. Using the copy icon for regular drags leaves us without an Apple icon for a option drag that would indicate a duplicate if we were to implement that command. So and option drag might not be a good idea.

While I think on it, remember that copy/paste works for creating duplicates. And this is a less confusing and simple enough to stand in instead of option drag. Also another way of telling what collections a movie is in without the collection names column is to use the contextual menu "Show in Collection" to view all the other collection a movie belongs to.

Thank you for the feedback on this tough UI issues and for the bug report.

[Conor]

With the beta I have included the option to hold down command-option during a drag from an excluded collection to add items to another collection without removing it from the original excluded collection. The confusion comes from the fact that the program was never meant to be able to do this (the bug is allowing "new collection from selection" to not place the items in the library and remove them from the excluded collection). We have not fixed it, as it does become useful in some cases, like creating a wish list sub-collection. We have updated the drag to make it more obvious what is going on using the drag icon. You will get the link/alias arrow when using the command-option technique from an excluded collection. In all other cases you will get the plus for adding to a collection and no icon when moving (dragging to an excluded collection).

[sjk]

Thanks a lot for the detailed explanation and changes. The display of the plus or alias arrow is a bit sensitive to when Option-Command are (un)pressed but overall it's definitely an improvement. Might have other comments after I've done more thorough testing.

(the bug is allowing "new collection from selection" to not place the items in the library and remove them from the excluded collection). We have not fixed it, as it does become useful in some cases, like creating a wish list sub-collection.

I appreciate you understanding how that bug can be exploited as a useful feature.