669392 - File and Directory paths should be cropped in the middle and not at the beginning of the path

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Toolkit :: Add-ons Manager, defect)

Description

[Henrik Skupin [:whimboo][⌚️UTC+2]]

Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.6; rv:7.0a1) Gecko/20110703 Firefox/7.0a1

The paths for files and directories are getting cropped at the beginning of the string. Instead we should crop and display ellipses in the middle of the string to give the user the chance to see the root path. Otherwise it's hard to figure out which file has been selected.

Comment 1

[Henrik Skupin [:whimboo][⌚️UTC+2]]

Attachment: screenshot

Comment 2

[Geoff Lankow (:darktrojan)]

Attachment: patch

I'm not really a fan of cropping in the middle either, but I think it probably is better than at the start. I've also added a minimum width to the left-hand column to stop it getting swamped by a large filename in the right-hand column.

Comment 3

[Brian King [:kinger]]

Where are these paths appearing?

What I usually do in such cases is:

a) provide a tooltip with the full path.

b) Use a textbox to display the path. It can be styled to not look like a textbox, and the user can copy the path.

Comment 4

[Blair McBride [:Unfocused] (UNAVAILABLE)]

Agreed with comment 3. When cropping text, the full text at least needs to show in a tooltip.

Being able to select and copy the path has some utility, but it makes the usual case of just reading the path less nice (since it essentially crops at the end, until you explicitly force the end to scroll into view).

Deferring to UX.

Comment 5

[Blair McBride [:Unfocused] (UNAVAILABLE)]

Comment on attachment 553652 [details] [diff] [review]
patch

Review of attachment 553652 [details] [diff] [review]:
-----------------------------------------------------------------

Agreed with comment 3. When cropping text, the full text at least needs to show in a tooltip.

Being able to

Comment 6

[Blair McBride [:Unfocused] (UNAVAILABLE)]

Er, ignore comment 5. Was meant to be just the r-

Comment 7

[Jennifer Morrow [:Boriss] (UX)]

(In reply to Blair McBride (:Unfocused) from comment #4)
> Agreed with comment 3. When cropping text, the full text at least needs to
> show in a tooltip.
> 
> Being able to select and copy the path has some utility, but it makes the
> usual case of just reading the path less nice (since it essentially crops at
> the end, until you explicitly force the end to scroll into view).
> 
> Deferring to UX.

I agree, let's crop in the middle with "..." and show the full string in a tooltip.

Comment 8

[Geoff Lankow (:darktrojan)]

Attachment: patch v2

Comment 9

[Geoff Lankow (:darktrojan)]

https://hg.mozilla.org/integration/mozilla-inbound/rev/2d9846b8eb28

Comment 10

[Ed Morley [:emorley]]

https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/rev/2d9846b8eb28