186504 - Header pane should scroll to new messages when a new folder is selected in folder pane

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(SeaMonkey :: MailNews: Message Display, defect)

Description

[Aleksey Nogin]

This is essentially a request to roll back the "fix" to bug 10872 or at least
make it pref-controllable.

In short, bug 10872 added two *major* annoyances:
- when a folder with new messages is selected (in folders pane), the headers
panes is scrolled to a position wherw no new headers are visible (so I have to
scroll before being able to read new messages).
- if I mark a selected message as unread before leaving a folder (something I
almost always do when briefly browsing new messages), then when I come back to
the folder, the message is selected again, automatically marked read again, and
I have to keep marking it unread *every time*

Reproducible: always :-(

To reproduce:
0) All my folders are sorted by date ascending (newest messages last).
1) Folder "A" has new messages. I go and read them.
2) After reading the new messages I delete or move a few and decide to read some
later. The selection in header pane is (naturally) on the last message of the
folder "A" and I mark it as unread (as I just said, I want to read it later).
3) I go to folder "B" (possibly in another account, does not matter) to read new
messages there
4) I notice that folder "A" now has more new messages. I go to folder "A" (by
selecting it in folders pane).

Expected (before bug 10872):
- The headers pane is scrolled so that at least one new header is shown
- The "read" status of the messages is not disturbed

Actual:
- The header pane is scrolled so that the previously selected header is the last
 displayed (since all new headers go after it). Big annoyance: I now have to
scroll the pane before I can start reading new messages (yes, in this partucular
case, I can just use the "nexdt" button, but since the new headers are not
visible it's never apparent whether the currently selected message is indeed the
last old message, or whether there are more olde headers before new ones).
- The previously selected message is selected. Extremely big annoyance: I just
marked the message as unread before leaving the folder. Now it's shown in the
message pane and automatically marked as read. Now I have to mark it as unread
again. One of the reasons this is such a big annoyance is that unless I
specifically make sure that I select some unread messsage every time before
leaving a folder, I have to keep marking the same message unred over and over
again... 

BuildID 2002122113 compiled and running on Red Hat Linux 8.0

Comment 1

[Aleksey Nogin]

Ah, there is a preference to disable this. Then the question is only - should
the deafault be "off"? IMHO, having it on has much bigger potential of being
annoying then having it off.

Comment 2

[[e-mail]]

Personally I think that such an intrusive preference should be easily available.

Comment 3

[Aaron Leventhal]

I agree, and have one more problem with it:
- the fact that the headers pane briefly flashes to the wrong place is very
confusing.

The fix to make it remember the last message has caused a lot of problems for me
as a keyboard user.

Comment 4

[[e-mail]]

Ah, the pref is in fact available in the main mail & newsgroups pref panel.

Comment 5

[Aaron Leventhal]

Even if there is a pref to turn this off, it shouldn't mark the message you go
back to as read so quickly, and it shouldn't flash the wrong list of headers for
a brief second -- that's really confusing.

Comment 6

[[e-mail]]

Right, so you think it should just scroll to the previous message, rather than
selecting it, and it should do this before getting new messages? Should it then
scroll again if there are any new messages?

Comment 7

[Samir Gehani]

Mail triage team: Jennifer, do you have a proposed solution for the problem
illustrated above?  Thanks.

Comment 8

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

platform all.  not minor, since this is on by default.  

I've been getting complaints about this.

one big one is that we go to the last selected message instead of any new messages.

Comment 9

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

note, Edit | Prefs | Mail & Newsgroups, look for a checkbox "Remember the last
selected message" to turn it off completely until we sort this out.

Comment 10

[jglick]

Is it desireable or possible to have the Thread Pane scroll to display the
newest msgs while still obeying the "remember last selected msg" setting? So, in
some cases, newest msgs would be visible, but the last selected msg may not be.

As for marking a selected msg Read when returning to a folder, 4.x seems to do
this too. Would it make sense or even be possible to not change the Unread
status of a selected msg when returning to a folder?

Comment 11

[selmer (gone)]

Maybe the description of the pref should change along with the behavior.  What I
want is for it to go to the first new message if there are any and only when
there aren't any should it go to the last selected message.  If it did this, I
would no longer be annoyed with it.  

The message read/unread thing is difficult to solve because the inverse of the
current annoyance is the one where it never marks the message as read.  One
possibility is to simply scroll the last selected message into the center of the
view but don't actually select anything at all.  (Assuming others also mainly
like this feature because it always scrolls to the right place.)  It might also
work to somehow highlight that message without actually selecting it, but that
seems wierd.

Comment 12

[[e-mail]]

Attachment: Only reselect when no new message to scroll to

Comment 13

[Samir Gehani]

Mail triage team: nsbeta1+/adt2

Comment 14

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

Attachment: neil's fix, plus his fix for #183331 (mail view related)

Comment 15

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

neil's fix is in, which means that if you've got new mail we'll scroll to it,
even if you have "remember last selected message" enabled.

but there are other issues in this bug report, so I'm not going to mark this
fixed until we decide which issues we want to fix, and spin them off to new bugs
(if necessary)

Comment 16

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

on second thought, let's mark this fixed and spin off other issues to new bugs.

Comment 17

[Ninoschka Baca]

Trunk build 2003-04-10: WinXP, Mac 10.1.5, Linux RH 8
Verified fixed. It remembers the last selected message when switching between
folders. If a new message appears in the Inbox then focus goes to the new
message, and the last selected message is not highlighted. 

Comment 18

[selmer (gone)]

Using 4/11 08 commercial build, this isn't working on my win2k box.  When I have
a message selected and new mail comes into the folder, it scrolls me down but
doesn't select anything.  According to the previous comment, it should have
selected the new message.

Comment 19

[[e-mail]]

Just to clear up any confusion:
if there's a new message, it is *scrolled* into view, but not selected
otherwise, if you have a remembered message, it is selected (and scrolled)
otherwise, the most recent is scrolled into view.

Comment 20

[selmer (gone)]

OK, that looks like what I'm seeing.