452183 - New tab behavior for opening multiple tabs is inconsistent with single tab behavior

Status: RESOLVED INVALID

(Firefox :: Tabbed Browser, defect)

Description

[Rick]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.0.1) Gecko/2008070208 Firefox/3.0.1
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.0.1) Gecko/2008070208 Firefox/3.0.1

To open multiple bookmarks in tabs, from the toolbar or sidebar, you can use either Ctrl+click or Ctrl+Shift+click (eg, on a folder).  Middle-click is equivalent to Ctrl+click, and the "Open All in Tabs" context menu is equivalent to Ctrl+Shift+click, so I won't mention those further.

Currently, Fx3 does this when opening multiple tabs:
. Ctrl:       Append all new tabs (in the fg) after the last existing tab
. Ctrl+Shift: Replace the current tab only (in the fg) and insert the rest before the next tab
(Note: When I say "in the fg" I mean the first new tab becomes focused, while "in the bg" means the current (old) tab remains focused.)

This is inconsistent with the role of Ctrl and Ctrl+shift for single tabs:
. Ctrl:       Append new tab (in the fg)
. Ctrl+Shift  Append new tab (in the bg)
(Note: This assumes 'loadBookmarksInBackground'=false (default).  Otherwise, the meanings of Ctrl and Ctrl+Shift are swapped.  Links behave similarly but use a different pref, 'loadInBackground'=true (default).)

First of all, I think that the two behaviors (multiple vs single) should be consistent so they are easy to remember, something like this for multiple tabs:
. Ctrl:       Replace the current tab only (in the fg) and insert the rest before the next tab
. Ctrl+Shift: Append all tabs (in the bg) after the last existing tab

This basically swaps the two; for Ctrl+Shift, the tabs are also loaded in the bg instead of the fg.

Second, the 'loadBookmarksInBackground' pref is not consulted at all, like it is for single new tabs, and it should be.  I consider this a minor bug.

Third, for people who abhor having their current tab replaced, there should be a new pref to change it, say, 'loadFolderAndReplaceCurrent'=true (default).  If this pref=false, then the new tabs would be appended in the fg, instead of the default replace&insert.  Note I'm not talking about the obsolete pref 'loadFolderAndReplace' which allowed you to replace all tabs in the way.


The changes to implement this would be pretty simple:

-------------------------------
utils.js (function: openTabset)
-------------------------------

CURRENT VERSION:
_openTabset: function PU__openTabset(aItemsToOpen, aEvent) {
  ...
  var loadInBackground = where == "tabshifted" ? true : false;
  var replaceCurrentTab = where == "tab" ? false : true;
  browserWindow.getBrowser().loadTabs(urls, loadInBackground, replaceCurrentTab);
}


PROPOSED VERSION w/o new pref:
_openTabset: function PU__openTabset(aItemsToOpen, aEvent) {
  ...
  var loadBmsInBg = getBoolPref("browser.tabs.loadBookmarksInBackground");
  loadInBackground = (where == "tabshifted") ? !loadBmsInBg : loadBmsInBg;
  var replaceCurrentTab = true;
  if (loadInBackground)
    replaceCurrentTab = false;
  browserWindow.getBrowser().loadTabs(urls, loadInBackground, replaceCurrentTab);
}

PROPOSED VERSION with new pref (just changed one line):
_openTabset: function PU__openTabset(aItemsToOpen, aEvent) {
  ...
  var loadBmsInBg = getBoolPref("browser.tabs.loadBookmarksInBackground");
  loadInBackground = (where == "tabshifted") ? !loadBmsInBg : loadBmsInBg;
  var replaceCurrentTab = getBoolPref("browser.tabs.loadFolderAndReplaceCurrent");   //RC new pref
  if (loadInBackground)
    replaceCurrentTab = false;
  browserWindow.getBrowser().loadTabs(urls, loadInBackground, replaceCurrentTab);
}



Reproducible: Always

Comment 1

[Simon Bünzli]

No duplicate, valid request, so confirming.

Comment 2

[Mike Connor [:mconnor]]

The Ctrl+Shift behaviour is wrong here.  It matches the left-click on "open all in tabs" behaviour, which is wrong.  Ctrl+Click, whether or not shift is pressed, should never replace the current tab.  Modifier-click openings should append, like for single bookmarks.

The loadBookmarksInBackground pref should be allowed to invert behaviour, while we still support that pref.  I think we might want to just drop support for that pref, tbh.

The third point is irrelevant, we should only replace the current tab on a left click of the open in tabs menuitem.

Essentially, we should:

1) File a bug on Ctrl+Shift not appending in the bg.
2) file a bug on the background pref being ignored
3) resolve this bug as INVALID, since it's reporting multiple issues, not bug-per-issue.

Comment 3

[Rick]

Ok (it's been a while), I agree completely with what Mike said, so I'll file the separate 2 bugs and mark this invalid.

Comment 4

[Rick]

The 2 new bugs file from this are: Bug 506986 and Bug 506988