59534 - Backspace after autocomplete does not delete last char typed

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(SeaMonkey :: UI Design, defect, P3)

Description

[Terry Hayes]

See bug 54396 (and bug 51910) for lots of background.  That bug dealt with a
specific patch to disable placing autocompletion results in the textbox after a
backspace or delete character.  This avoids having to type two backspaces to
delete each character in the data entered.  However to delete the intial
character the user still has to type two backspace characters.

As mentioned in bug 51910, the problem is that inserting "selected" text into
the textbox for the result of autocompletion doesn't work.  The user did not
"select" the text, the autocompletion code did.  The user will not necessarily
see what is going on, and will be confused when normal typing does not cause the
intended result.

Two possible solutions:
  1) Do not insert text into the text box (this has already been suggested).
  2) Insert text into the box that is marked as "autocomplete text" (rather than
selected).

Autocomplete text should be displayed in a different style (perhaps a grey
color).  The cursor should also be displayed at the point where new text will be
inserted, or a deletion will occur. When the user types any new character, the
autocomplete text is *always* removed, and then the normal processing for the
character should occur.  Note that this is different than the processing for
selected text in the case where the user types backspace.

For example:

1) the user types abcdeg in the addressing window.  After autocompletion the
window should contain "abcdeg^[@netscape.com]"  "^" is the cursor, and "[]"
indicates the autocompletion text.
2) the user types backspace.  The autocomplete text is removed and then the
character deletion is processed.  The result is "abcde^".
3) Auto complete runs (after 300msec).  The result is "abcde^[@netscape.com]"
4) the user types 'f'.  The result is "abcdef^", which is autocompleted to
"abcdef^[@netscape.com]"

Comment 1

[Marcia Knous [:marcia]]

Netscape Nav Triage Team: Reassigning to German - please analyze and renominate 
if necessary.

Comment 2

[hangas]

Sending to hewitt, part of autocomplete work he has in progress

Comment 3

[Joe Hewitt (gone)]

fixed

Comment 4

[Jesse Ruderman]

This regressed.  Instead of reopening this bug, I filed bug 135019.