308815 - Under Linux, the "Choose Helper Application" should allow the user to type the command to use

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 57420

(Firefox :: File Handling, defect)

Description

[Francois Ingelrest]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8b4) Gecko/20050908 Firefox/1.4
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; U; Linux i686; en-US; rv:1.8b4) Gecko/20050908 Firefox/1.4

When I click on a link for a .pdf file (or another kind of file), the "Helper"
dialog box allows me to save the file to the disk, to use the associated program
or to search for another program to use. The latter is a good option under
Windows, but under Linux it is faster to simply type the command name.
Otherwise, I have to browse to /usr/bin and wait a long time for the dialog to
load all the binaries or links present there. It could be done in only a few
seconds by simply typing the command name.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.

Comment 1

[Tobias Sager]

I see this with Firefox 1.4.1 (1.5beta2).

The desired behaviour is working for the Ctrl-O "Open Location" dialog and should be solved similarly for the "Open with.." dialog.

Propose to include "dialog", "exact" and "path" in summary.

Comment 2

[Tobias Sager]

This works for me now. Just typing /usr/bin/blah highlights that file in the
dialog and I can select it by pressing enter.

There is a long delay for loading my /usr/bin directory though (2700 files). That could be circumvented by using a text box for entering the filename.

Comment 3

[wy2lam]

I was bitten by this defect.

The old Helper chooser dialog wasn't broke, why fix it and take away flexibility at the same time?  There should be a text box to enter the command directly, together with any desired arguments.

Comment 4

[andrew]

I agree. IMO, it's better to have a consistant application interface within one O/S than for one application to have a consistant UI across platforms, but if you are going for the latter, don't acheive conformity by removing functionality that people use and value.

Comment 5

[Peter]

(In reply to comment #4)
> I agree. IMO, it's better to have a consistant application interface within one
> O/S than for one application to have a consistant UI across platforms, but if
> you are going for the latter, don't acheive conformity by removing
> functionality that people use and value.
> 

Indeed what's wrong with including a text box in the Windows version as well.  Some people who use Windows still know how to type a file path!

Comment 6

[Phil Ringnalda (:philor)]

*** Bug 327326 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 7

[ian]

Confirmed in Thunderbird (version 1.5.0.2 (20060602)) too.   PLEASE CONFIRM IT.

Plainly put, this "Choose helper application" dialog box SUCKS.  Why do I have to wait about a minute for the window to load all the files in the bin directory?  Can't I just have a textbox so I can type "/usr/bin/xview" and be done with it?  I want a file chooser that lets me use my keyboard, instead of just the mouse.

Trying really hard not to have a bad attitude here, but I was trying to view an email message with too many attachments and couldn't (https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=223340).  And so I sat there ACTUALLY DEBATING whether I felt like setting up the helper application.  IT JUST TAKES SO DAMN LONG, I thought... and my PC is pretty fast.  

This is the first time a mozilla application has actually made me angry.

Come on.  Not even a user preference to enable a textbox in the file dialog?

Comment 8

[andrew]

Confirm for Firefox 1.5.0.4

Very annoying. I want to quickly change the sound player from "play" to "realplay" so I can seek in the file. I should be able to just type "realplay", but no, I have to type "which realplay" in a shell window, then navigate
painfully slowly to the result of that in the GUI.