482027 - Being able to remember better the last folders selected for bookmarking

Status: UNCONFIRMED

(Firefox :: Bookmarks & History, enhancement, P5)

Description

[Dominique De Vito]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.0.6) Gecko/2009011913 Firefox/3.0.6
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.0; en-US; rv:1.9.0.6) Gecko/2009011913 Firefox/3.0.6

First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has previously selected for bookmarking. 
Secondly, while bookmarking, I need to click to open the panel showing the last folders and to click again for choosing one. 

Reproducible: Always




First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has previously selected for bookmarking. I would like Firefox to remember a number of folders that could be given through a parameter. Secondly, while bookmarking, I need to click to open the panel showing the last folders and to click again for choosing one. I would rather prefer Firefox to open automatically this panel in order to avoid one click over two. 

See point (8): http://www.jroller.com/dmdevito/entry/some_simple_firefox_enhancements_i

Comment 1

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

(In reply to comment #0)
> First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has
> previously selected for bookmarking. 

So, what is a good number in your opinion: 6, 10? and why? and why 5 is bad?

> Secondly, while bookmarking, I need to click to open the panel showing the last
> folders and to click again for choosing one. 

what's the suggestion, and why?

Comment 2

[Dominique De Vito]

(In reply to comment #1)
> (In reply to comment #0)
> > First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has
> > previously selected for bookmarking. 
> So, what is a good number in your opinion: 6, 10? and why? and why 5 is bad?

Just give users the capability to set the right number (option).

Note : I have set this enhancement request due to my Firefox experience. That's not a request from theory land.


> > Secondly, while bookmarking, I need to click to open the panel showing the last
> > folders and to click again for choosing one. 
> what's the suggestion, and why?

When a user clicks for bookmarking, open also automatically the (sub)panel showing the last folders. Then, when bookmarking, users avoid 1 click over 2. Improvement ratio = 50%: not that bad, isn't it ?

Comment 3

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

(In reply to comment #2)
> (In reply to comment #1)
> > (In reply to comment #0)
> > > First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has
> > > previously selected for bookmarking. 
> > So, what is a good number in your opinion: 6, 10? and why? and why 5 is bad?
> 
> Just give users the capability to set the right number (option).

adding tons of options does not usually help users achieving tasks faster, and is not the usual correct way to handle things.

> When a user clicks for bookmarking, open also automatically the (sub)panel
> showing the last folders. Then, when bookmarking, users avoid 1 click over 2.
> Improvement ratio = 50%: not that bad, isn't it ?

that would mean we will open a submenu when user did not request it, so supposing i'm not interested in the last used folders, that will increase the number of clicks i need to get rid of the open panel by a 50%. So this is a one wins one lose solution.

Even if i agree we could find a better way to handle that, adding an option and expanding a panel do not sound as applicable options.

Comment 4

[Dominique De Vito]

(In reply to comment #3)
> (In reply to comment #2)
> > (In reply to comment #1)
> > > (In reply to comment #0)
> > > > First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has
> > > > previously selected for bookmarking. 
> > > So, what is a good number in your opinion: 6, 10? and why? and why 5 is bad?
> > 
> > Just give users the capability to set the right number (option).
> 
> adding tons of options does not usually help users achieving tasks faster, and
> is not the usual correct way to handle things.

I don't know if there is such a best/correct way to handle such a thing...

Well, again, here are my arguments:
- Firefox currently only remembers only the last 5 bookmarking folders
- but users have bigger and bigger computer screens,
- so, it's strongly counterproductive, and irrating too, that Firefox only proposes the last 5 bookmark folders, when a user wants to select a folder when bookmarking.

Users are happy when they have choice, and IMHO, proposing only the last 5 bookmark folders if not I call having (enough) choice. It's a small choice set, taking not enough benefit of my screen/computer capabilities.

While (1) proposing more folders is not a change needing a lot of programming, and while (2) a lot of users would be happy with a such a change, why not such a change ?
Thanks.

Comment 5

[gillux]

Attachment: Makes the number of recent bookmarks folder to be an about:config option.

I think that remembering the last five folders is a good default for a simple usage, i.e. bookmarking some pages once in a while. But for advanced users who heavily bookmarks tons of pages, it can be very tedious. I suggest keeping the five folders as a default and allowing to change that with an about:config option. And here is a patch for that. Reviews appreciated. :)

Comment 6

[Dietrich Ayala (:dietrich)]

Comment on attachment 571412 [details] [diff] [review]
Makes the number of recent bookmarks folder to be an about:config option.

Review of attachment 571412 [details] [diff] [review]:
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Hi, thanks for the patch!

However, Marco is correct that making this a pref is not the right approach. That's the right approach for an add-on.

For the core, we need to explore why the folders you want are not in the list, and if there's a smarter way to solve that problem than just adding more folders (see Marco's previous comments about that).

Comment 7

[Dominique De Vito]

Hi Dietrich,

* about the use case:
There is a use case (at least one); indeed, when I have zillions of open tabs, I often clean up the mess while bookmarking few tabs in order to decrease the CPU/memory burden on the shoulders of Firefox. Firefox remembers my last 5 folders I used for bookmarking, and it's often not quite enough if, during my clean up, I want to bookmark N tabs, with N >> 5.

Well, when I close tabs, one by one, I follow the tab logic, and there is then little chance that the folder I would choose for bookmarking is going to be into the last 5 folders I used. 
There is an alternative: not closing tabs, one after another one, from left to right, or right to left, but for the last remembered 5 folders, to search into all my existing tabs the tabs I could bookmark inside these folders to maximize the "folder memory" locality. But according to my experience, this alternative is more cumbersome, because it implies to navigate intensively among existing tabs, instead of bookmarking them one by one, from left to right, or right to left.

* about:config versus an add-on
AFAIK, the '5' limit is currently hard-coded as a constant, so "about:config" looks like the right place (versus an add-on), furthermore, for such (IMHO) little feature.

Regards

Comment 8

[Dominique De Vito]

While my use cas is not seen valuable enough for the trunk, and as I don't want to write here tons of lines for defending this use case, I just want to add one argument: a software aimed to be customizable should not hard-code any value; as far as it's possible, those values should be instead mutable, and users should have the ability to modify them.
That's all.

Comment 9

[Simon Dedman]

+1 for this patch being written into the core so users can change the default in the about:config. Rationale, since that's somewhat what this debate hinges on:

"adding tons of options does not usually help users achieving tasks faster, and is not the usual correct way to handle things"
- It's adding one option
- This would clearly help the users that cared about it implement one task faster
- "Correct way of handling things" seems specious, especially in the case of firefox which is wonderfully unique insofar as it has three layers of modifications: default UI settings, access to the backend code tweaking console (about:config), and add-on extensions. Given firefox already has a weirder/more unique way of doing things than most anything else, moving things from hidden defaults, decided by mozilla & locked to users, to being pushed into about:config and editable by technically minded users, seems like a no-brainer.
- the patch is already written, therefore minimal work

"For the core, we need to explore why the folders you want are not in the list, and if there's a smarter way to solve that problem than just adding more folders"
Not in the list: because people who have lots of bookmarks folder & bookmark often & visit a range of sites with different topics will inevitably have this problem.
I don't see this problem as something particularly deep, needing to be solved with clever solutions. Users already have the option of going to the full list relatively easily. Giving us the ability to add more folders isn't lazy fud coding, it's taking a guesstimate number chosen by mozilla to encompass all usage cases and tweaking it to one's personal usage case.

Comment 10

[Pander]

Adding bookmarks, for user who add a lot of bookmarks, is very impractical as adding with Ctrl+D adds a bookmark to "Bookmarks Menu" and clicking the star adds a bookmark to "Unsorted Bookmarks". It is possible to choose another bookmark folder with Ctrl+D but that is returned to default "Bookmarks Menu" after restarting Firefox.

A first small, but very practical step, would be to make the bookmark folder for Ctrl+D persistent over restarts of Firefox. If a user selects there as "Unsorted Bookmarks", bookmarks added by either method end up in the same place and in the proper order. Disadvantage of adding in two different places by alternating these two different methods is that the relative order of adding is lost, the order is distributed over to folders.

Comment 12

[Pander]

Could this bug please get fixed before it turns ten years old?

Comment 13

[yxu]

Is there any update for this issue?

Before using legacy add-ons, we added a feature in the Chinese firefox version through extension, which is to remember where the last bookmark was saved instead of using other bookmarks folder each time when a bookmark is added. This feature has no discomfort to the user. As we all know because of the use of WebExtension, 57 version is no longer supported. So after the release of 57 many users want to add this feature back.

There is another extension can achieve this feature: https://addons.mozilla.org/zh-CN/firefox/addon/add-bookmark-here-2/?src=ss. I think we can see from the comments and the amount of users to the needs of this feature.

Comment 14

[Piotr W Kozłowski]

Comment on attachment 571412 [details] [diff] [review]
Makes the number of recent bookmarks folder to be an about:config option.

Hi, this is really the very important and extremely necessary change in UI ... but how to apply it in Firefox 56, I am just starting my "coding" flirt in life but have no experience in editing java ... please give me more instruction

Comment 15

[Piotr W Kozłowski]

(In reply to Dominique De Vito from comment #4)
> (In reply to comment #3)
> > (In reply to comment #2)
> > > (In reply to comment #1)
> > > > (In reply to comment #0)
> > > > > First, Firefox is only able to remember the last 5 folders a user has
> > > > > previously selected for bookmarking. 
> > > > So, what is a good number in your opinion: 6, 10? and why? and why 5 is bad?
> > > 
> > > Just give users the capability to set the right number (option).
> > 
> > adding tons of options does not usually help users achieving tasks faster, and
> > is not the usual correct way to handle things.
> 
> I don't know if there is such a best/correct way to handle such a thing...
> 
> Well, again, here are my arguments:
> - Firefox currently only remembers only the last 5 bookmarking folders
> - but users have bigger and bigger computer screens,
> - so, it's strongly counterproductive, and irrating too, that Firefox only
> proposes the last 5 bookmark folders, when a user wants to select a folder
> when bookmarking.
> 
> Users are happy when they have choice, and IMHO, proposing only the last 5
> bookmark folders if not I call having (enough) choice. It's a small choice
> set, taking not enough benefit of my screen/computer capabilities.
> 
> While (1) proposing more folders is not a change needing a lot of
> programming, and while (2) a lot of users would be happy with a such a
> change, why not such a change ?
> Thanks.

If you can not find the use of this option just ignore it ... I am the researcher so frequently sorting of data/info sources in definitively more than 5 folders (recently used) ... have 100+ folders for separate data and scrolling through all of them as used 6th one is the pain in the... there should be not number of folders as limit but time FI week to vanish from shortlist but even this is not good as when I have holidays or week break in this type of work I would have to start over by scrolling full list of folders... this waste my time..

Comment 16

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

First, it's not possible to apply patches to Firefox 56, the only version that may take a similar patch is Nightly, that will become Firefox 64.
Your use-case is a little bit particular. The problem with extending the number of items is that it easily opens a bunch of edge-case bugs where the list may not fit the screen, and we'd surely not have time/resources to fix those. It should also properly handle cases where the user wrongly sets it to a negative number, or 0.
In the past it was possible to use an add-on to change this, now it's not, so we could also take a patch to add this pref, though, it should be done properly, that means it should be done through defineLazyPreferenceGetter, it should have a min and a max (probably 0-20), that can be implemented using the defineLazyPreferenceGetter aTransform argument. The name can also be shortened to maxRecentFolders.