29439 - file: directory listing needs hidden files pref

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(Core :: Networking: File, enhancement)

Description

[Henrik Gemal]

If you do local browsing hidden files are not shown. This should not be the case 
if the user has the "Show all files" option in Explorer to on.

The "Show all files" option:
Start Windows Explorer
View -> Folder Options -> View -> Hidden Files (Show all files)

This will set this reg.db setting:
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced]
"Hidden"=dword:00000001

More info:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/psdk/bestprac/Topics/RULE40.HTM

Expected:
If the "Show all files" is on Hidden files should be shown!

Comment 1

[Gagan]

->warren

Comment 2

[Gagan]

->warren

Comment 3

[Warren Harris]

I don't know if this is an issue for Doug Turner or Bill Law.

Comment 4

[Doug Turner (:dougt)]

By design?

http://lxr.mozilla.org/seamonkey/source/netwerk/base/src/nsDirectoryIndexStream.
cpp#183

Robert, what was the reason behind this?

Comment 5

[Robert John Churchill]

Reason for the hidden file check:

Mac users should never be shown hidden files, otherwise they see lots of special 
files/folders which they shouldn't.

On Windows, you could certainly enhance the code to show hidden files or not 
based upon the "Show all files" option (if you care to).

Similar situation for Unix.  (Perhaps check some environment variable? Or 
pref? Or whatever.)

In general, if you don't want to add support for controlling whether to show 
hidden files or not, I believe its best to opt for not showing them, as most 
users don't know/care, and they add clutter to file listings.

Comment 6

[don]

Move to M16 for now ...

Comment 7

[Warren Harris]

Maybe the defaults should be different for different platforms. I think unix 
users want to see .files when they do a listing.

At the very least, there should be a pref for this, and probably a checkbox in 
the prefs ui.

Comment 8

[Robert John Churchill]

As mentioned, I think that a pref for this would be great.  Who wants to step up 
for implementing it?

[For Mac users, the pref is irrelevant... invisible files/folders should NEVER 
be shown.]

The reason why I believe that we SHOULD NOT show invisible files by default on 
other platforms is because usually the OS in question doesn't either.  To see 
"invisible" files/folders, you have to specifically state that's what you want.

Examples:
(Unix) "ls -a"
(DOS) "dir /ah"
(Windows) You have to enable the "Show Hidden Files" option (buried in the UI)

Against, the average user probably doesn't care about invisible files... they 
were made that way for a reason.

Comment 9

[don]

Move to M21 target milestone.

Comment 10

[benc]

mass move, v2.
qa to me.

Comment 11

[Henrik Gemal]

RFE cleanup. RFE is already indicated by the Severity field...Sorry for the 
spam!

Comment 12

[benc]

clarified summary.
testcase:
MacOS: probably root level of MacOS still has DesktopDB (hidden file)
UNIX: use home directory
Windows: 

I think Rob's comments, generally suggest that this should be a UNIX/Win pref.
In MacOS, invisible files are beyond visibility in the Finder.

Comment 13

[Bill Law]

Setting target milestone.

Comment 14

[benc]

+[RFE] - sorry, not everyone has room to display "severity"...

Comment 15

[benc]

MacOS X is a bit weird:

Unix files are visible, if they are group owned admin, but not wheel. So many of
the top level / links appear inside "macintosh hd", but cannot resolve if you
click on them.

In Terminal.app, the default users are members of both groups "admin" and
"wheel". Weird. Need to research more.

Comment 16

[R.K.Aa.]

*** Bug 147073 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 17

[benc]

Updating to Win-only.
Mach-O does display hidden files, as does Linux (Mozilla 1.4a)

Comment 18

[Jesse Ruderman]

*** Bug 252874 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 19

[Jo Hermans]

*** Bug 318891 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 20

[reflexionsniveau]

(In reply to comment #17)
> Updating to Win-only.
> Mach-O does display hidden files, as does Linux (Mozilla 1.4a)

I disagree making this bug win-only. The request is a preference to display/not display hidden files, which applies to all systems. For example on Linux systems it is annoying that hidden files (ie. the ones starting with a dot) are displayed no matter what. A preference for that would make the directory listing a lot more usable.

Comment 21

[esigra]

Unfortunately this does not seem to work anymore with Thunderbird 1.5.0.8. I
need to attach a file in a hidden subdirectory of my home directory, but not
even .<TAB> does will show it. The whole file dialog seems very primitive and
with this problem even buggy and should really be replaced with the native file
dialog (from kdelibs in my case). Openoffice can do that, so it is possible.

Comment 22

[Foteos Macrides]

This bug still exits on WinXP (please adjust OS from its present Win98, as was done for duplicate Bug 252874).  It is present in the trunk code that is soon to become Fx3.0, despite other, substantial enhancements in that code for local directory listings. There is a check box in the listings now with the label "Show hidden objects" but it determines whether or not dot files will be hidden, and dot files are not hidden objects on MW Windows. If you enter a file URL for a OS hidden directory, e.g., for the Application Data directory in one's Documents and Settings directory, you do get a listing and can descend its tree to one's Firefox profile, but none of those hidden directories or files are placed in history, and a listing for the Application Data's parent directory still doesn't include it.  This bug exists when one has made the OS setting such that "Hidden Folders and Files" should be displayed and My Computer does respect that setting, i.e., includes them in its listings.

Comment 23

[David Balažic]

Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.2.13) Gecko/20101203 Firefox/3.6.13 ( .NET CLR 3.5.30729)


Yes.

Comment 24

[David Balažic]

Chrome 8, IE8, Opera 11 all display hidden files/folders (on WinXP).

Does this warrant some parity flags to the whiteboard?

Comment 25

[Patrick McManus [:mcmanus]]

This isn't on anyone's work list and realistically is an abandoned idea. I will close as wontfix - if someone has a patch or is actively going to work on it please reopen. (but please, only then.)