80971 - cleanup: remove the hidden menu item from compose (currently necessary to get the offline indicator to work)

Status: VERIFIED FIXED

(MailNews Core :: Composition, defect)

Description

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

add "File | Work Offline" to compose, or remove the hidden menu item.

I was able to remove the onfocus hander for msg compose, and clean up the 
offline handling.  but, to get the utitlityOverlay to work I needed to have 
something observe the "Communicator:WorkMode" broadcaster.  in nav, 3 pane, and 
std alone msg window, we have a "Work Offline" menuitem.  msg compose 
doesn't have this, so I added it, but made it hidden since it wasn't in the 
spec.

I need to figure out a non-hacky way to get the offline indicator to work 
needing a menuitem like that.

or, if "File | Work Offline" should be in the compose menu, can we update the 
spec?

Comment 1

[Jean-Francois Ducarroz]

reassign to varada

Comment 2

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

note, 4.x did not have "File | Work Offline" in the compose window.

if we have an offline indicator, and clicking it will take you offline, should 
have a way (via menus) to go offline?

task bar icons, which will open an application if you click on them, have menu 
equivalents.

Comment 3

[jglick]

I don't feel strongly either way on this one, but I guess my preference would be 
to leave it out of the menus in Mail Compose. I've never heard a complaint of it 
missing.

Comment 4

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

can you add your decision to the spec and a link to it here?  then I can morph
the bug into the proper problem.  (right now, it is sitting on the fence).

moving to future / minor for varada.

Comment 5

[jglick]

Lets leave it out of Mail Compose unless there are objections. The current Mail 
Compose menu spec, does NOT have the offline stuff in the File menu, that good 
enough for a decision?  :-)

http://www.mozilla.org/mailnews/specs/compose/Comp_Menus.html

Comment 6

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

jglick:  that's what I was looking for.

updating summary.  now the problem is we need to remove that "hidden" menu item
that is only there as a hack to get the offline indicator to work properly.

this is really a cleanup bug.  I better add a comment to the xul so that someone
doesn't remove the menu item before we are ready (and break the offline indicator)

no longer a bug for varada, since the cleanup will have to take place in
utilityOverlay.js / .xul

Comment 7

[timeless]

personally I go offline to prevent myself from accidentally sending a message 
before it's really ready. But in nc4 i've always used the widget...

Comment 8

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

On Mac OS, menus should remain identical (as far as possible) between different
windows of the same app. Items should be enabled/disabled, rather than
shown/hidden, to maximize stability of the UI. See, for example, the `Format'
menu in Outlook Express, which is always present even though only one of its
items is relevant outside of message composition; and the `File' > `Get Info'
item in Internet Explorer, which is always present but only enabled when the
Favorites window has focus and a favorite is selected.

If the `Work Offline' item was missing from the `File' menu only when a message
composition window had focus, that would appear to be a bug. It would also be an
accessibility problem, since keyboard-only users would have to switch to another
window (assuming that there was even another window open) in order to go
offline, and then switch back to the composition window.

> I've never heard a complaint of it missing.

Maybe that's because it wasn't missing in 4.x.

Comment 9

[jglick]

Mail Compose is a Sub window of Three Pane Mail. It is not one of the Main 
Component Windows.  Not only are the menus available in Mail Compose vs 
Three Pane Mail different but so are most of the items in the few menus that are 
the same.  Almost every item in the Mail Compose menus are specific to the task 
of composing a message, while the menu items in Three Pane Mail are more global 
to mail as a whole component.  If Mail Compose duplicated all the menu items 
available in three pane mail, the menus would be huge and contain mostly items 
not relevant to the task of composing a message.  

4.x Mac Mail Compose has "Offline" menu (Mac uses one shared menu bar for all 
windows), but Windows does not (Windows uses separate menu bars for each 
window).

Comment 10

[Matthew T (active 1999-2002)]

> If Mail Compose duplicated all the menu items available in three pane mail,

as they do in Outlook Express,

> the menus would be huge and contain mostly items not relevant to the task of
> composing a message.

Outlook Express's menus are large, but not huge. E.g. the `Format' menu is 
present for all windows, but almost all of its items are only enabled when a 
composition window has focus.

In the case of working online/offline, however, I think it is important to 
include that in the menus on *all* platforms, for the reasons I described 
earlier. If the composition window is the only one open, I shouldn't have to 
open and close another window just to switch to offline mode (so I can save the 
message in the local Drafts folder instead of the IMAP Drafts folder, for 
example).

Comment 11

[[e-mail]]

Attachment: Proposed patch

Comment 12

[[e-mail]]

Comment on attachment 114008 [details] [diff] [review]
Proposed patch

Although this patch works for me you may find you need to apply my patch to bug
179728 first.

Comment 13

[Cavin Song]

Comment on attachment 114008 [details] [diff] [review]
Proposed patch

r=cavin.

Comment 14

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

Comment on attachment 114008 [details] [diff] [review]
Proposed patch

sr=sspitzer, assuming that you tested and the offline indicator and menu item
match up.

but it sounds like we need that other fix, too

also, I think this can wait until 1.4 alpha, as it is code cleanup.

Comment 15

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

over to neil for 1.4 alpha

Comment 16

[(not reading, please use [e-mail] instead)]

depends on #179728

Comment 17

[[e-mail]]

/me must remember to check these in :-)

Comment 18

[[e-mail]]

Fix checked in.

Comment 19

[Stephen Donner [:stephend] Not actively reading bugmail]

1.266	neil%parkwaycc.co.uk	Sep 11 02:08	 	Bug 80971 cleanup the hidden menuitem
from compose r=cavin sr=sspitzer (yes it's an old patch, it was marked depends
on 179728?)

Verified REMOVED in version 1.266 of messengercompose.xul.