278386 - Message navigation keys and menus don't work (Next unread, previous, etc) if account selected and no message folder selected - message list/thread pane empty/Account Central is shown. Or, no folder selection in folder pane.

Status: NEW

(Thunderbird :: Folder and Message Lists, defect)

Description

[Bradley T Hughes]

When starting Thunderbird, the "intro" page for the default account is shown, 
but the "next unread message" button/shortcut is disabled, even if there are 
unread messages for the default account.  Once I select a folder or select 
"Read messages" (which goes to the inbox), the "next unread message" 
button/shortcut starts to work.

Comment 1

[John]

this behaviour is the same for any account that is present, i.e. a blog or
newsgroup - not limited to default acc.

Comment 2

[Mike Cowperthwaite]

*** Bug 324229 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 3

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

David, Karsten, do we know if there is an historical reason for this behavior?
Or is it because a view is not available to operate on?

slight workflow improvement if "next" were not restrictive in this way.

SM version of this is bug 242206
xref bug 453834

Comment 4

[David :Bienvenu]

Wayne, my guess would be that it's simply because there's no view available, or more accurately, no thread pane.js loaded.

Comment 6

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Marco, Bruce, is this an accessibility issue, that message nav keys don't work in these scenarios?  Seems to me an assumption could be made, that navigation should go to the first folder displayed in folder pane.

Comment 7

[BJ]

Wayne,

I'm not sure but my guess is that it's not an accessibility issue:

1) This bug is 5 years old and I don't know if TB works the same way. When I open TB it goes to the mail folder I was last using. And since I don't w ant it to go to the first unread message I've never tried to get it to do this.

To get the account into page you would need to have selected the account in the pane before you closed TB. Or at least that's the only way I can get the intro pane (I have 2 accounts set up by the way).

But I notice that you can move around the place the with tab key but hitting return never seems to activate the functions in the intro pane.

2) I believe accessibility s/w needs to be writtenn to be aware of the application. To have something like "open next message" as a commange from access s/w it would need to be built in. I'm sure no accessibilty s/w was TB aware 5 years ago. And still isn't today.

Comment 8

[Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ)]

My take on this is this:

1. I think those quick navigation keys like "n" to go to next unread message should work only when focus is in the messages list of a folder.

2.  1 is because we have a strong request from the blindness community that, if focus is on the folders list, hitting the first or first few letters should navigate toa folder stating with those letters. So if you're on inbox, hitting d should take you to Drafts or the first folder starting with d.

Ever since Thunderbird started to be really accessible, especially blind users who cannot use the mouse to quickly click on some folder, have wanted this feature.

So I'd be much in favor of the way it is now, that those single-letter navigation commands and switches only work when keyboard focus is in the messages list, but that additionally, first letter navigation be implemented/enabled for the folder tree.

Comment 9

[BJ]

Marco - thanks for confirming this relates to TB built in commands that I didn't know about (until now), and not to functions added within access s/w that is not working. I also agree with your rationale about when/where they work.

Comment 10

[BJ]

(In reply to comment #7)
> Wayne,
> 
> I'm not sure but my guess is that it's not an accessibility issue:
> 
> 1) This bug is 5 years old and I don't know if TB works the same way. When I
> open TB it goes to the mail folder I was last using. And since I don't w ant it
> to go to the first unread message I've never tried to get it to do this.
> 
> To get the account into page you would need to have selected the account in the
> pane before you closed TB. Or at least that's the only way I can get the intro
> pane (I have 2 accounts set up by the way).
> 
> But I notice that you can move around the place the with tab key but hitting
> return never seems to activate the functions in the intro pane.
> 
> 2) I believe accessibility s/w needs to be writtenn to be aware of the
> application. To have something like "open next message" as a commange from
> access s/w it would need to be built in. I'm sure no accessibilty s/w was TB
> aware 5 years ago. And still isn't today.

Final para of item 2 "But I notice that you can move around the place the with tab key but hitting return never seems to activate the functions in the intro pane." is wrong. Ir works fine. Sorry.

Comment 11

[Vesa Jääskeläinen]

So yo are not even planning to support following scenario, what I do quite often?

- I know that I should have mail coming to some account
- I select this account name with mouse and then click on Get Mail -button.
- Then I would press 'n' to to go next unread message to go automatically to folder where the message went because of automatic message filtering/moving. (For now I need to hunt down for new messages where they went)

Now this is really useful for some newsgroups that I only occasinally read. I do not have auto checking for those. So I only select newsgroup account, click on Get Mail and then would like to press 'n' to go to next unread message.

Comment 12

[John David Galt]

I'm used to using 'n' to step through all unread mail.  This has worked in all accounts (except some oddball cases involving the top, account folder itself in an RSS feed account) until now.  It should be made to always work again.

I've been able to work around it, most of the time, by clicking on the [+] to expand the thread whose summary I'm viewing, but that is annoying; in fact, I would like to have an option to turn off the whole 'thread summary' feature, which I find useless.

Comment 13

[Onno Ekker [:nONoNonO UTC+1]]

It's not only the keys that are disabled. All the functions in the menu Go (Next, Previous, Forward and Back) are disabled when an account is selected in the folder pane. Also if you move their button to the Mail Toolbar these buttons are disabled when an account is selected.

Comment 17

[Onno Ekker [:nONoNonO UTC+1]]

(In reply to Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ) from comment #8)
> My take on this is this:
> 
> 1. I think those quick navigation keys like "n" to go to next unread message
> should work only when focus is in the messages list of a folder.
> 
> 2.  1 is because we have a strong request from the blindness community that,
> if focus is on the folders list, hitting the first or first few letters
> should navigate toa folder stating with those letters. So if you're on
> inbox, hitting d should take you to Drafts or the first folder starting with
> d.
> 
> Ever since Thunderbird started to be really accessible, especially blind
> users who cannot use the mouse to quickly click on some folder, have wanted
> this feature.
> 
> So I'd be much in favor of the way it is now, that those single-letter
> navigation commands and switches only work when keyboard focus is in the
> messages list, but that additionally, first letter navigation be
> implemented/enabled for the folder tree.

I think it would be much more clear and consistent to have a quick search function in the folder pane, e.g. by typing '/' and then the first few characters of the name of a folder to go there. At the moment I use the Nostalgy add-on, which implements this function by typing 'G for Go to folder.

Comment 18

[Philipp Kewisch [:Fallen][📱📆]]

(In reply to Onno Ekker [:nONoNonO UTC+1] from comment #17)
> I think it would be much more clear and consistent to have a quick search
> function in the folder pane, e.g. by typing '/' and then the first few
> characters of the name of a folder to go there. At the moment I use the
> Nostalgy add-on, which implements this function by typing 'G for Go to
> folder.
See also the one I wrote: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/quick-folder-move/ which uses Shift+G and Shift+M for move and go to. This is not what the bug is about though, it is about the existing keys not working because for some strange reason the folder is unselected. I've spend a few hours trying to reproduce this consistently and trying to debug it, but have had no luck.

Comment 19

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Got burned by this again today - wasted considerable time - because the folder wasn't selected, even though I'm in a tab that identifies as displaying the folder.  Message list was displayed, I wasn't on an account page.  (At one point I was in quick search, and message pane showed "find".)

What I don't know, and what might the real bug, is how did the folder get deselected?  How is this happening to others?

How do we fix?


(In reply to Marco Zehe (:MarcoZ) from comment #8)
> My take on this is this:
> ...
> 2.  1 is because we have a strong request from the blindness community that,
> if focus is on the folders list, hitting the first or first few letters
> should navigate toa folder stating with those letters. So if you're on
> inbox, hitting d should take you to Drafts or the first folder starting with
> d.
> 
> Ever since Thunderbird started to be really accessible, especially blind
> users who cannot use the mouse to quickly click on some folder, have wanted
> this feature.
> 
> So I'd be much in favor of the way it is now, that those single-letter
> navigation commands and switches only work when keyboard focus is in the
> messages list, but that additionally, first letter navigation be
> implemented/enabled for the folder tree.

#2 is bug 476822 (took a while to find it)

Comment 20

[Anje]

Using 78.9.0
This bug is still present.
If any mail account is selected and focus is in right pane, you cannot use Tab to get focus onto the FolderPane.
Workaround:
so currently forced to use 'Alt+G' to get access to 'Go' and from there use arrow keys to select folder.
OR
Use 'Tab' key or 'Shift+Tab' to get focus in 'Global Search' box with flashing cursor
Use 'Shift+Tab' to get brown outline on search box
Use 'Tab' key to get focus in Global Search with flashing cursor again
Use 'Tab' key to go back to brown outline of Global Search box
Now you can use arrow to go up or down Folder Pane.

This really needs looking into finding a less convoluted way of getting out of problem and access to Folder Pane.

Comment 21

[Wayne Mery (:wsmwk)]

Aleca for perspective

Comment 22

[Alessandro Castellani [:aleca]]

We also have F6 and SHIFT+F6 which is a shortcut that loops through the 3 primary panes (folder, threads, message).
So when you're in the Account central, or inside an email, or the focus is anywhere else in the app, you can hit F6 and the folder pane is 1 or 2 keystrokes away.

I agree that this might not be the most convenient and discoverable solution, and we should maybe investigate a global shortcut combination that always focuses on the Folder pane.