39245 - slide show, browse through a series of pages

Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX

(SeaMonkey :: General, enhancement, P3)

Description

[André Langhorst]

A very interesting feature would be a "slide show" like option for mozilla. I
think if a toolbar with at least [next] and [previous] links to walk through a
predined set of bookmarks or otherwise specified pages.
Example:
Got to work, turn on computer, read email, view stock quotes, view mozilla news,
view php news, view general news, view technology news, begin work....
... review stock quotes ... work .. review stock quotes and news ...

There are several pages a user visits every day, being able to browse them in a
row, without searching in bookmarks (opening folder personal->finance->stock
quotes->realtime->netscape share etc.) only clicking next to browse through a
set of bookmarks.

It would also be fine to be able to create different categories.
Select a category in the "slide show" bar, then browse through sites with one click.

Options:
-Opening every page in a different browser window
-preloading of next page
-displaying next and last two,three... in category in the "slide show" bar

Comment 1

[Brian Staples]

Sounds a little complicated to code although I'm not a programmer yet. Anyway a 
feature like this would be handy, very handy. Maybe it could be built into the 
next, back buttons somehow using the bookmarks in conjunction with something 
added to autocomplete to keep track of how often and how many times a site is 
visited. It would also have to be programmable.

Comment 2

[Jesse Ruderman]

Is there a clean way to do this using frames or the sidebar?

Comment 3

[André Langhorst]

a few ideas: the sidebar should be used only for detail view, the main 
functionality should be accessible from a new toolbar (not bigger than the 
personal toolbar) with "next", "previous", the current page title and some 
other stuff we find useful.
The sidebar should contain detail view. Divided into two panes. The above 
should work just like the bookmark component to select no bookmark rather to 
select a category at the end. The first 10(15,20...) pages should then be 
listed in the lower pane of the sidebar without collapsing and decollapsing 
(they also should get a new icon, categories too). A gui of course is needed 
too.
This "slide show" could also be combined with the shedule function to allow the 
user clicking "update all", mozilla looks then if the pages in the current 
category have been updated and if yes it changes its icon, then the guy looking 
for example for drivers or news can select the site which have been updated.
No one needs to create bookmarks fot all those site, then click every bookmarks 
properties, then activate the shedule function and configure endless things.
The user just clicks one buttons to let mozilla look for them and he can btw 
investigate the first site while mozilla does the rest.
I think much of that functionality could be recycled from other components.

Comment 4

[André Langhorst]

*** Bug 10191 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 5

[André Langhorst]

idea from bug 10191, color coding(or different icons) for different protocols

Comment 6

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

This is basically the same as the `Queue' idea I suggested a looooooong time ago 
-- where a series of pages is pre-loaded at the start of a session (e.g. the home 
pages of the sites you visit every day), so you can just flick from one to the 
next (using Next and Previous buttons) without having to wait for them to load 
(or even without having to go on-line again).

The reason I eventually binned the idea is that you could end up with up to
*three* different `previous'/`next' navigation elements on the screen: the
Back/Forward buttons, the Previous/Next LINK element buttons, and the buttons for 
this feature. And given that you can do something similar to this pretty well 
with the existing UI (open a bunch of windows, load a bookmark in each, then 
flick between the windows), I estimated that the extra usefulness of having a 
dedicated Queue wasn't worth the extra confusion that would be caused.

Creating a separate XUL utility for taking Mozilla through such a slideshow would 
be quite easy, and would perhaps be a better option than building the feature 
into Mozilla itself.

Comment 7

[André Langhorst]

I think it´w no question that the feature has to be implemented, ok...
but an integration into the sidebar would result in a better aplication (can´t
XUL be integrated too?), like "bookmarks", "tinderbox" etc. there would be a
pane "slide" (or some kind of a better name) from which the "slide" toolbar
could be activated and deactived, if the user isn´t interested in this feature,
he would never have noticed that this feature is present (except he clicked an
View->toolbars->slide) and he wouldn´t be confused, but advanced users can
navigate with a nice and slim toolbar, directly integrated into mozilla, without
hassle opening a "slide show manager" which floats around and needs to be
dragged away of hiding some feature, or am I wrong about XUL?

Comment 8

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

You're probably wrong in assuming that the sidebar will take kindly to being 
resized to be `a nice and slim toolbar'. Chances are it will assume you want to 
collapse it ...

Comment 9

[André Langhorst]

no you misunderstood that, the sidebar can rest as wealthy as now and should
contain advanced options for the slide component, but an additional "toolbar"
like the "personal toolbar" should ensure slim and quick and simple access to
this component...

Comment 10

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

helpwanted

Comment 11

[Jesse Ruderman]

preloaded?

Comment 12

[André Langhorst]

the previous summary did not really catch the core
"slide show series of pages is pre-loaded at the start of a session" <-
preloading is just (not highest priority) one additional feature, the main
features are:
- simplicity in browsing categorized sets of pages, no need to use the sidebar
- openening a set of pages, each in a different window
- hidden pre-loading of pages, when sequentially browsing pages

-

Comment 13

[Jesse Ruderman]

"openening a set of pages, each in a different window" overlaps with bug 9274.

Comment 14

[André Langhorst]

overlap is not the right word, they both contain similar words but they´re not
even close to each other i think, btw bug 9274 contains some wishes which
wouldn´t (if they would) be implemented in a build before m26 i think :)

Comment 15

[Asa Dotzler [:asa]]

Sorry for the spam.  New QA Contact for Browser General.  Thanks for your help
Joseph (good luck with the new job) and welcome aboard Doron Rosenberg

Comment 16

[André Langhorst]

I think this is deprecated by the emerging blogs+tools and fb's "open in folder
in tabs" equally well... setting to won't fix

Comment 17

[R.K.Aa.]

*** Bug 240069 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***