105955 - MailNews Should be Viewable in a Tab

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(SeaMonkey :: Tabbed Browser, enhancement)

Description

[Phil Miller]

The MailNews component of Mozilla should be available not only in a seperate
window, but also in a tab if the user chooses for it to display this way. This
would make it more convinient to have multiple applications running while
Mozilla is running, since it would only appear once on the Windows taskbar,
which is why I used to love the Opera browser. My build-ID is Mozilla/5.0
(Windows; U; Win98; en-US; rv:0.9.5) Gecko/20011011.

Comment 1

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

I don't know if this RFE will fixed
(see bug 102480)

Comment 2

[Keyser Sose]

Marking NEW.

Comment 3

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

*** Bug 107915 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 4

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

*** Bug 117937 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 5

[Blake Ross]

Come on, this is such bloat.  Multiple webpages in a window is one thing, but 
having MailNews in a tab would be ridiculous, and would turn the browser into an 
operating system.

Windows XP allows you to group all taskbar icons from one app into one taskbar 
icon.

This is so wontfix.

Comment 6

[Phil Miller]

Guess What?
Not all of us use, or ever plan to use Window$ XP.
This most deifinitely not bloat, 
as Opera manages to do it rather well. I find its ability to keep everything in one window, 
seperate from everything else running on my system, quite nice, and I bet others do as 
well.
Another thing: This would create almost no bloat at all, as it would only require 
creating the ability to display MailNews using the chrome:// style URI. In theory, it's already 
possible, but there is no way for a user who doesn't know the trick to use it. All I'm suggesting is 
adding a simple way of doing this within the normal interface.

Comment 7

[Robert Wall]

*** Bug 126957 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 8

[Hixie (not reading bugmail)]

WONTFIX. We should be separating the applications, not merging them further.

Petition your OS maker to get a tabbed window manager.

Comment 9

[Jarrod Gray]

You can do this to some degree already by opening
"chrome://messenger/content/messenger.xul" in a tab. Granted it doesn't look
real good but it does work.

I don't believe this joins the browser and mailnews anymore than they already
are. It only provides a different location to view the mailnews content.

Comment 10

[Hixie (not reading bugmail)]

Yes, exactly. No more than they already are -- which is too close already.

Comment 11

[Boris Zbarsky [:bzbarsky]]

*** Bug 146502 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 12

[Daniel Wang]

*** Bug 165002 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 13

[Josh Emmons]

Come on!  This has 6 duplicate bugs and you think it's a wontfix?  If mail/news
is being broken out of the browser now (and by now I mean in 1.1 or 1.2 beta),
then this should be a wontfix.  But the fact is that breaking mail/news out
would require a complete rewrite of mail/news and probably composer et al.

It looks like, for good or evil, mail/news is going to be a part of the browser
for a long time.  If that is so, why be fascist about how people can look at it.
 Many of us come from MDI-like OSes and, for reasons that are not your place to
judge, would prefer a MDI-like mozilla.  Deal.  If you don't want to do the
work, fine.  But at least open the bug back up so we can have a place to work on
making mozilla better.

Comment 14

[Jo Hermans]

*** Bug 170896 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 15

[Daniel Wang]

re: comment 13
Including mail in the tabbed browser will also require extensive
UI rewrite, specifically due to different menu structure and UI
layout.

Also, for accessbility reasons, this should be a WONTFIX. Integrate
mail/news into a browser and you run into all sorts of usability
issues. Switching between a Web page and the mail/news window and
you have to switch the layout of the toolbar also. The location bar,
once separated from the toolbar, will have to be hidden. The
personal bar will work very weird (sure, there's a enhancement
request for allowing message bookmarking, but can a casual user
figure it out?). The components bar will work differently depending
on the context. Cognitive stress explodes because users have to
remember in what mode they are working in and what keyboard shortcuts
work (or don't work) in what mode (take Ctrl+T, for example).

With MDI, the issue is the same--casual users just can't figure
out MDI. The advanced users may be pissed about the decision to
WONTFIX MDI and this bug, but it's way better to ask advanced users
to deal with it than to ask casual users to deal with it.

Comment 16

[Daniel Wang]

of course, I'm grossly wrong about using the term `accessibility'.
I really meant `usability', but whatever...

Comment 17

[Alfonso Martinez]

*** Bug 188222 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 18

[Alfonso Martinez]

*** Bug 191129 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 19

[Matthias Versen [:Matti]]

*** Bug 204946 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 20

[R.K.Aa.]

*** Bug 237894 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 21

[R.K.Aa.]

*** Bug 238135 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***