Open Bug 1839781 Opened 2 years ago Updated 1 years ago

Add new flag for excluding some characters from "layout.word_select.stop_at_punctuation"

Categories

(Core :: Layout, enhancement)

Firefox 114
enhancement

Tracking

()

People

(Reporter: maximtsyba, Unassigned)

Details

Steps to reproduce:

In Firefox there is "layout.word_select.stop_at_punctuation" config flag, which, when enabled, will stop double-click drag selection at any "non letter" character in the sentence.

Also, there's "layout.word_select.stop_at_underscore" flag, which would prevent selection from stopping at underscore (_) symbol — which makes sense, as this symbol is regularly used in code variable names, which are usually selected and copied as a whole.

Actual results:

However, there are also many other cases with in-word characters over the web, in which user most likely wants to select whole word rather than it's parts. For example, emails (example@example.com), domains (bugzilla.mozilla.org), hyphen separated therms (n-type), etc.

To select them as a whole with double click, user has to select first or last word of the phrase first, and then carefully extend the selection, trying not to mistakenly select other words or symbols. This adds unnecessary friction to basic interactions with the browser.

Expected results:

I can think of 2 possible solutions to this:

  1. Add a flag, which will prevent double-click drag selection from stopping at selected symbols (.@/-), if they're part of phrase, e.g. not surrounded by spaces on one or both sides

  2. Add a flag, which will select the whole phrase with symbols in it, when double click on any "non-letter" symbol (in example with email, double-click on "@" will select the whole email address instead of just this symbol). This approach probably provides more flexibility, as user keeps the ability to select separate parts of a phrase with double-click, but will likely be less discoverable and noticable, leading to most users being unware of this feature, even if it will be enabled by default.

The Bugbug bot thinks this bug should belong to the 'Core::Layout' component, and is moving the bug to that component. Please correct in case you think the bot is wrong.

Component: Untriaged → Layout
Product: Firefox → Core

Hello! Thank you for submitting this issue. I will mark this issue as NEW in order to get our developers involved and take it into consideration for further releases,

Have a nice day!

Status: UNCONFIRMED → NEW
Ever confirmed: true
You need to log in before you can comment on or make changes to this bug.