Open Bug 541198 Opened 14 years ago Updated 2 years ago

Mac Tab Navigation Shortcut Keys inconsistent with Firefox, Safari, Chromium, Finder, Terminal etc.; need to implement general tab switching shortcuts Cmd+Shift+] and Cmd+Shift+[

Categories

(Thunderbird :: Toolbars and Tabs, defect)

x86
macOS
defect

Tracking

(Not tracked)

People

(Reporter: mjnkml, Unassigned)

References

(Blocks 1 open bug)

Details

Attachments

(1 file)

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.6; en-GB; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20091221 Firefox/3.5.7
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; U; Intel Mac OS X 10.6; en-GB; rv:1.9.1.7) Gecko/20100111 Thunderbird/3.0.1

The tab navigation keys in OSX is generally Cmd-Shift-[,Cmd-Shift-] ( or if you like: Cmd-{, Cmd-} ).

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1. Open a new message in a new tab
2. Try pressing Cmd-Shift-[ (doesn't work)
3. Try pressing Ctrl+Tab (works)
Actual Results:  
No tab change at step 2.

Expected Results:  
Tab change at step 2.

While it's relatively trivial, it can become a frustrating usability issue. At first I thought it wasn't working at all (i.e. I didn't even think to use Ctrl-Tab), and was consequently impaired until the release of 3.0.1 (hey, I still don't know if Ctrl+Tab works in 3.0.0 - probably it did as I can't find relevant bugs).
Version: unspecified → 3.0
This can (should?) be categorised as "OS Integration".
Component: Toolbars and Tabs → OS Integration
Component: OS Integration → Toolbars and Tabs
(In reply to comment #1)
> This can (should?) be categorised as "OS Integration".

not really. Its strictly UI iiuc
Blocks: tabsmeta
Status: UNCONFIRMED → NEW
Ever confirmed: true
Digging around in the source, this looks like the code to handle this is present: http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/suite/browser/tabbrowser.xml?force=1#197

I wonder why this isn't being reached?
Nevermind, I presume that /browser is only part of seamonkey.
Looks like the existing shortcuts are in http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/mozilla/toolkit/content/widgets/tabbox.xml?force=1, for those following along at home.
For reference, here's the corresponding Firefox code that handles this:

http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/browser/base/content/tabbrowser.xml#2377
Hey Neil, you seem like the most likely choice of reviewer for this.  I don't know if there's a reason these keys weren't added in toolkit/content/widgets/tabbox.xml, instead of in browser/base/content/tabbrowser.xml, but this seems like the obvious place to add them to me.

(I haven't removed the code to handle the keys from browser/base/content/tabbrowser.xml either, so please let me know if you think this is the right way to go, and if you want me to do that as part of this patch.)

Thanks,
Blake.
Assignee: nobody → bwinton
Status: NEW → ASSIGNED
Attachment #543044 - Flags: feedback?(enndeakin)
Comment on attachment 543044 [details] [diff] [review]
A first cut at adding cmd-shift-[/] keys.

Review of attachment 543044 [details] [diff] [review]:
-----------------------------------------------------------------

This doesn't appear to be a general tab-switching shortcut, but is instead specific to tab browsing. For instance, it doesn't do anything in the system preferences windows.
Attachment #543044 - Flags: feedback?(enndeakin) → feedback-
I don't see any actual tabs in the System Preferences window, so I don't know if it counts.

It does work to switch tabs in Terminal.app and iChat.app.

Having said that, I'm more than happy to implement the logic again in /mail/.  :)

Thanks for the quick feedback,
Blake.
I just hit this again (I guess that shows how often I use tabs in Thunderbird), and it's rather frustrating. Neil, what precisely was the problem with Blake's patch?
Neil, see comment 11.
I don't remember what my reason was above. Perhaps I wanted to work in the preferences window as well.
Summary: Tab Navigation Shortcut Keys inconsistent with Firefox / Safari, e.g. Ctrl-Tab instead of Cmd-Shift-] → Mac Tab Navigation Shortcut Keys inconsistent with Firefox / Safari, e.g. Ctrl-Tab instead of Cmd-Shift-]
I'm not really working on these, so I'm freeing them up for a community member to take.
(Filter on [ossifrage] to delete all the notifications.)
Assignee: bwinton → nobody
Status: ASSIGNED → NEW
What a shame, Blake's beautiful, useful, ux-consistent, convenient, and one-for-all patch attachment 543044 [details] [diff] [review] rotting away for no reason while keyboard-centric MAC users are still inconvenienced by this... :(

Oh yes, we could wait another 4 years to get more duplicates and waste more of bug triagers' time, OR perhaps we could just do the right thing and fix this along the lines of Blake's patch.

User experience from duplicate bug 1058373:

> STR:
> 
> Want to use general shortcut ("cmd + shift + [" or "cmd + shift + ]") to switch between tabs under
> Mac OSX (tested on OSX 10.9)
> 
> Actual results:
> 
> nothing
> 
> Expected results:
> 
> go to next or previous tab, like Firefox, Safari, Chromium, Finder, Terminal and many other
> applications under OSX.
> 
> Currently TB has "cmd+tab" and "ctl+fn+up/down" (aka Ctrl+Page-up/down) to switch between tabs,
> but it's not convenient according to Mac's keyboard layout and not consistent with many other
> applications.
Given that comment 9, the only vaguely adverse comment so far, appears to be withdrawn per subsequent comment 13, I can see lots of convincing PROs, but not single CON against this. So can someone check and comment if attachment 543044 [details] [diff] [review] can be revived and is still appropriate to implement this?

I believe Blake's approach of implementing this in toolkit's tabbox.xml really makes sense, given that:
- Firefox already has these shortcuts for switching tabs
- Thunderbird wants these shortcuts for switching tabs
-> So the two main consumers of tabbox.xml are already on boat.
- Given the widespread use in other MAC apps like browsers, terminal, finder, iChat, etc., I can't see any reason why a potential consumer of tabbox.xml would NOT want these general shortcuts to work?
Summary: Mac Tab Navigation Shortcut Keys inconsistent with Firefox / Safari, e.g. Ctrl-Tab instead of Cmd-Shift-] → Mac Tab Navigation Shortcut Keys inconsistent with Firefox, Safari, Chromium, Finder, Terminal etc.; need to implement general tab switching shortcuts Cmd+Shift+] and Cmd+Shift+[
Comment on attachment 543044 [details] [diff] [review]
A first cut at adding cmd-shift-[/] keys.

(In reply to Thomas D. from comment #17)
> I believe Blake's approach of implementing this in toolkit's tabbox.xml
> really makes sense, given that:
> - Firefox already has these shortcuts for switching tabs
> - Thunderbird wants these shortcuts for switching tabs

Just confirmed by TB UX lead...:

(In reply to Blake Winton (:bwinton) from Bug 1058373 Comment 8)
> (In reply to Thomas D. from comment #5)
> > So the next thing is to find a coder who can/will implement this, and then
> > get official UI-review for the patch.
> 
> Wearing my mac-user hat, I'm going to give this a preliminary ui-r+, based
> soley on the description.  ;)

(ctd. Thomas D. from comment #17)
> -> So the two main consumers of tabbox.xml are already on boat.
> - Given the widespread use in other MAC apps like browsers, terminal,
> finder, iChat, etc., ...

...this looks like the right thing to do in toolkit! :)
Attachment #543044 - Flags: feedback+
Severity: normal → S3
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